SF 239 
.B6 
1913 
Copy 1 



.*'<. 




Book._j3J2 



Copyright^?. 



/ 



iiA 



COPYRIGHT DEPOSIT 



1 




IMLglSii 












■JjM 




«b *pk 




M 




-•'yy 1 




imp: v 

imm" - 1 


: .III*!; iJSJ 






v ' 1 




HHl 






' JT' * * 


Hf *j£ii 






: . *\ 






§>, y ' 








'* *^ifo ) 


& % Mk* 






~^^H 


•£wm 






» /4l 


Ht . ^pB 











OLD TIME AND MODERN COW-LORE 

RECTIFIED, CONCENTRATED AND RECORDED 

FOR THE BENEFIT OF MAN 

BY 

JACOB BIGGLE 
n 



ILLUSTRATED 



44 The man who does not love a cow 
Is but a poor stick anyhow." 



PHILADELPHIA 

WILMER ATKINSON CO. 
1913 






Copyright, 1897 

Copyright, 1913 

Wilmer Atkinson Co. 

fifth edition 
forty-fifth thousand 



i 



DCIA3S7D64 



CONTENTS. 



PAGE 

List of Colored Plates 6 

Preface t . * . . . . 7 

Chart Showing External Cow 9 

Chapter I. Statistics 11 

Chapter II. Breeds 13 

Chapter III. The Bull 21 

Chapter IV. Mother Cow 23 

Chapter V. Baby 31 

Chapter VI. The Heifer 35 

Chapter VII. The Ox 37 

Chapter VIII. Food and Drink .39 

Chapter IX. Food and Drink, {Continued) 47 

Chapter X. The Barn 53 

Chapter XI. Stable Requisites 59 

Chapter XII. The Good Milker 63 

Chapter XIII. Milk and Cream „ 67 

Chapter XIV Butter o ... 73 

Chapter XV. Imitations 81 

Chapter XVI. Cheese 83 

Chapter XVII. Beef 89 

Chapter XVIII. By-Products 93 

Chapter XIX. Winter ... 99 

Chapter XX. Points on Markets 103 

Chapter XXI. Dairy Appliances 109 

Chapter XXII. Public Creamery 117 

Chapter XXIII. Villager's One Cow 123 

Chapter XXIV. The Milk Farm 127 

Chapter XXV. Ailments and Remedies 131 

Chapter XXVI. Round-up . . . 141 

Index 144 



LIST OF COLORED PLATES. 



PLATE I. 
PLATE II. 
PLATE III. 
PLATE IV. 
PLATE V. 
PLATE VI. 
PLATE VII. 



Jersey Cow. 
Guernsey Cow. 
Ayrshire Cow. 
Holstein-Friesian Cow. 
Hereford Cow. 
Shorthorn Cow. 
Galloway Cow. 



PLATE VIII. Red Polled Cow. 




" The lowing herd winds slowly o'er the lea.' 



PREFACE. 




The dairy business is un- 
dergoing rapid changes the 
world over ; nowhere more 
rapidly than in America. The 
invention and perfection of the 
separator have hastened the es- 
tablishment of the factory sys- 
tem, and the creamery is in suc- 
cessful operation everywhere. 
Feeding has been reduced 
to a simple and exact science 
as a result of the joint work of agricultural chemists 
and practical dairymen. The silo is appearing on 
farm after farm. The silage crops will presently in- 
crease in number, and will include peas and beans as 
well as corn and other grasses. 

The bacteria of ferments have been subjected to 
commercial harness, and put to work. Butter flavor 
is under control. 

Reliable milk testing apparatus is on the market, 
and the percentage of fat in milk can be ascertained 
quickly and cheaply. 

The science of cattle breeding is receiving more 
and more attention, and we now have a considerable 
number of herd books on this side of the Atlantic. 



8 PREFACE. 

Improvement in American dairy stock is steadily ad- 
vancing. 

No ambitious young American need be ashamed 
to choose dairying for a profession, for it is as much 
of a profession in fact as any calling now practised in 
this country. It takes good brains, good judgment 
and long experience to make the most of it. Dairying 
has a great future, I am sure, and it need not be cast 
aside even by young men who have promised them- 
selves future fame and riches. It is a noble calling. 

There has been a great awakening to the fact that 
the dairy cow is a most reliable source of farm profits. 
Dairy profits are in one sense small, but they are 
unremitting. There is never an interruption in the 
demand for wholesome human food. Total dairy 
products of the United States far outrival the gold out- 
put of all the mines of the world. 

The publishers ask me to extend their thanks 
to D. H. Goodell, O. D. Munn, S. Mather & Sons, 
W. M. Beninger, Ezra Michener, K. B, Armour, 
Smiths & Powell Co., J. D. Avery, S. M. Winslow, 
J. Cheston Morris, M. D., S. P. Clarke, Moseley & 
Stoddard Mfg. Co., and other kind friends who have 
furnished them with photographs of the breeds in 
which they are interested. Nearly all the illustrations 
of animals are reproductions of photographs. The 
colored plates were painted by a skilled live stock artist, 
and faithfully show the leading breeds they represent. 

May every cow owner find this little book to be a 
guide and helper in the coming years. J. B. 



Reference Chart 
Showing Parts of the External Cow. 




o 


Poll 


I 


Neck 


2 


Jugular Gutter 


3 


Muzzle 


4 


Withers 


5 


Dewlap 


6 


Point of Shoulder 


7 


Back 


8 


Forearm 


9 


Knee 


10 


Cannon 


n 


Shoulder 


12 


Side of Chest 


13 


Angle of Haunch 


14 


Root of Tail 


T o 


Tail 


16 


Switch 



17 Escutcheon 

18 Udder 

19 Hip Joint 

20 Flank 

21 Stifle-joint 

22 Hock 

23 Point of Hock 

24 Cannon 

25 Foot 

26 Coronet 

27 Claw 

28 Ergot 

29 Croup 

30 Belly 

31 Elbow 

32 Buttock. 



( I T \ I ■ I I R I 



M \ I IM [( :. 




" Thi cattU upon a thousand hi/Is," 

< .1 eal Is the (I. hi v o >w ! 
I I. ill l«) Ik i | Bui it Bhe 

|l . Ih. in <>, h •<» |)< 'iiii.l . < »l mill; 

*&tm I" ' N ' •" ' ( " '"»" I" Ml1 "' " "' 

hull, i , away with liei I She 
Is n< »i pri ifitable, 

Ami ye\ the average < ow oi the I United States 
[( . . ih. in ij p< mnds i -I null pei yeai • 

'i here are fifteen t< i twenty millions oi dah v 1 1 iws 
in the i in 1, 1 1 ! Itati , and enough i >thei « attic to make 
.1 grand total oi oyer fifty million head, This, <>f 

Bourse, i"« lud< s bulls, « • • en, j •• st< m I , and the 

-I. .it iifuls "i i' i i ■ u in. h i.MMi the plains oi the 
West, 

There are aboul half b million M h ► i « n i ■ • I « 1 > i * • < i . In 
the i ountry, i ighl million ( hali oi highei I grades, 
.Hid more than tei fcy million u s< i ubs, M so < ailed, ( I 
in. 1. 1 to sp< ak < >i iii« in as nath es ; and yet s< >me <»i 
them are u scrubs' 1 In fad ) 

'i lure .in • :i I >< mi hn< < n million i alves boi n every 

y.-.u in Ih. I ml- (I | itat< •• 

The average value oi the dairy cow, take the 
country ov< r, is only about $22.50, Curiously < tiough, 



12 BIGGLE COW BOOK. 

the smallest state in the Union has the highest priced 
cows — $38.33, average. This tells of good dairying in 
Rhode Island. 

As to the total dairy and beef products of the 
United States, per annum, the figures are so large as 
to be bewildering. The gold-hunters find only eighty- 
five million a year, while a single by-product of Ameri- 
can cattle (the manure) is rated as worth more than 
seven times that amount of money ! It is surer than 
gold, too. 

The cows of the United States yield eight thousand 
million gallons of milk per year, the butter product 
is one and one-half billion pounds, and the product of 
cheese three hundred million pounds — grand figures, 
indeed, and enough to make us vain. 

But to be officially informed that we send abroad 
eight-tenths as much oleomargarine as butter does not 
lead to vanity but toward mortification. The 5,700,000 
farms of the United States should be flavoring Europe's 
bread with good butter and cheese. 

There are now about 5000 creameries and cheese 
factories in the United States. They have sprung up, 
for the most part, within a quarter of a century, and 
their number is rapidly increasing. Dairying, as a 
business, is making rapid strides in this country. 



Chapter II. 
BREEDS. 

The thoroughbred animal is a good home missionary ; it 
teaches a better way. — Tim. 

The more important of the thoroughbred cattle in 
the United States are here briefly described. 

Full descriptions of the points which are con- 
sidered essential in judging the different breeds are 
usually to be found in the herd books issued by the 
respective breeders' associations. A list of the pres- 
ent secretaries of the leading clubs and associations 
will be found at the end of the book. 

Jersey. Origin, Channel Islands. 
x . ^ Average weight of cow, 800 pounds. 
'%s?V Purpose, butter. Color, "gray-fawn 
and white, yellow-fawn and white, 
gray-dun and white, gray and white, 
silver-gray dun, cream-color, fawn," 
etc. Often dark-colored on nose and legs. The Jersey 
is characterized by "neatness of form, slender frame, 
deer-like head, and gentleness. ' ' No cow is higher in 
American favor. See colored Plate I. 

" Of all the creatures the farm can boast, — 
And in my time I've seen a host, — 
The dearest one to me I trow , 
And pet of the place, is our Jersey cow." 




14 BIGGLE COW BOOK. 

Guernsey. Origin, Channel Islands. Average 
weight of cow, 900 pounds. Purpose, butter. Color, 
an irregular yellow and white, or red and white, 

or sometimes of solid 
colors, or nearly so. 
Coarser in frame and 
less beautiful than the 
Jersey, but her equal 
in percentage of butter 
fat and her superior in 
quantity of milk. A 

LEMON-COLORED GUERNSEY BULL. gentle CQW Qf highest 

dairy merit. Shown in colored Plate II. 

The Channel Islands cattle, both Guernsey and 
Jersey, are of the very highest value to the butter 
maker. They are also in demand among milk pro- 
ducers, being used to " color up " or make yellow the 
milk of other breeds. 

These cattle are built upon the triangle plan — 
heavy and deep behind and rather light in front ; the 
milking type. They are characterized by yellow skins, 
the color being particularly noticeable inside the ears. 
They breed early. 

The Channel Islands cattle have been bred pure, 
it is said, for five hundred years ; and it is unlawful to 
carry any living bull, of any breed, to these islands. 

Alderney was a name formerly, but not now, 
applied to the Channel Islands cattle, especially the 
Jerseys. 

Ayrshire. Origin, County of Ayr, Scotland. 
Weight of cow, 900 pounds. Purpose, dairy. Color, 
usually red or brown and white, in large patches. 



BREEDS. 



15 




AYRSHIRE BULL. 



Origin, Denmark, Ger- 



Sometimes all red or brown ; sometimes black and 

white. An old breed. She has been called " the rent- 
payer." 

This cow is hardy. Her admirers claim she will 

produce a larger quantity 

of good milk for the food 

consumed than any other 

breed. She is classed as 

a cheese cow rather than 

as a butter cow, though 

also a good butter maker. 

A beautiful Ayrshire is 

shown in colored Plate III. 
Holstein-Friesian. 

many, Holland. Weight of cow, 1200 to 1400 pounds. 

Purpose, milk, cheese ; though also used for butter. 

Color, usually black and white. A noble race. The 
name is a compromise, now 
jrj^ including blood from several 

"^m Uk.TF ~'JSk former families. The typical 
Holstein-Friesian is well 
known. This breed has 
probably the highest milk 
record in the world for quan- 
a prize holstein. tity, and recent breeding has 

produced marvelous butter families. A famous cow 

is shown in Plate IV. 

Hereford. Origin, England. Weight of cow, 

1200 to 1400 pounds. Purpose, milk, cheese, beef. 

Color, a distinct red, not too dark ; white face, mane, 

breast and belly ; white end to tail, and white legs as 

high as knee and hock. 




l6 BIGGLE COW BOOK. 

This is a breed of great antiquity and recognized 
merit. The Herefords are good but not deep milkers. 
As beef makers they are at the top of the market. 
They are hardy, and well adapted to cold climates. 
A prize winning cow is shown in colored Plate V. 

Shorthorn. Formerly called Durham. Ori- 
gin, England. Weight of cow, 1200 to 1600 pounds. 
Purpose, milk, cheese, beef. Color, roan, white, red, 
white and red ; but not in spots. See the roan type 
in colored Plate VI. 

The breed is comparatively modern, and is in 
I] high favor in England and in 
I certain parts of the United 
I States. The Shorthorn is 
1; without a rival for beef, and 
EH has been bred up to a good 
^M| milking standard. She is 
shorthorn bull. unrivaled for cheese making. 
When bred strictly for beef the ideal Shorthorn 
assumes the shape of a parallelogram, from what- 
ever point viewed. 

Devon. Of English origin. Weight of cow (there 
are two strains in America) 
1000 to 1200 pounds. Pur- 
pose, milk, beef. Color, a 
rich dark red. 

The milk of the Devon 
is said to be especially a- 
dapted for human food, par- 
ticularly the food of infants, "taurus," a famous devon. 
The Devons are smaller than the Shorthorns and 
Herefords, but larger than the Ayrshires and Channel 





BREEDS. 17 

Islands cattle. The udder is comparatively small, and 
the milk yield usually above what would be expected. 
The milking period is long. Devon beef has a high 
reputation. The breed is an old one. 

Aberdeen-Angus. Polled Angus, Polled Aber- 
deen-Angus. A hornless breed, of Scotch origin. 
Weight of cow, 1300 or 1400 pounds. Purpose, milk, 
beef. Bred pure for three-quarters of a century. Black. 

Considerable numbers have come to the United 
States, and are now advertised by their breeders. 
They hold high rank for certain purposes, especially 
for beef. This breed, when exposed to winter weather, 
develops an excellent coat that makes a warm carriage 
robe when properly tanned. 

Dutch Belted. Origin, Holland. Weight of 
cow, 1200 pounds. Purpose, dairy products, beef. 




A DUTCH BELTED GROUP. 

Color, black and white, the white being in a blanket 
around the body. 

This belted stock is beautiful, but its standard of 
purity appears to be in part a matter of fancy. 

Galloway. Of Scotch origin. Weight of cow, 



i8 



BIGGLE COW BOOK. 



1250 pounds. Purpose, milk and beef. Color, black 
with brownish tinge. See colored Plate VII. 

The Galloways are a polled or hornless breed, 
especially adapted to cold, exposed countries, as they 
are very hardy. They are bred in the United States 
and advertised in the agricultural papers. These hardy 
animals have thick coats of hair. 

Red Polled. Of English origin. Weight of 
cow, 1300 or 1400 pounds. Purpose, beef, milk, 
cheese, Pure bred for a century. Color, a deep red, 






THREE YOUNG ONES AND THEIR FATHER. 

with udder of the same color ; but tip of tail may be 
white. Nose not dark or cloudy. 

This hornless breed was formerly known as Nor- 
folk Polled or Suffolk Polled. The Red Polled cattle 
are adapted to severe winters, and are growing in 
favor in the northern and western portions of the 
United States. The Red Polled cow does not mature 
as early as the smaller breeds. See colored Plate VIII. 

Brown Swiss. Origin, Switzerland. Weight 
of cow, 1 200 to 1 300 pounds. Purpose, dairy products. 
Color, dun or mouse, fading to gray on back, with a 
strip of light gray or nearly white along the belly. 

There are two varieties of Swiss cattle in the 
United States, commonly known as the brown and 



BREEDS. 



19 




BROWN SWISS COW. 



the spotted. The Brown Schwytzer was imported in 
1869, and at once made a good record. The Simmen- 
thal (Simmenthaler) or Bernese cow is a larger animal, 
and differently marked, hav- 
ing irregular and sharply de- 
fined spots or bars of red, 
yellow or drab. This breed 
has a high repute for useful- 
ness as work oxen, and is an 
excellent strain for the dairy. 

The American Holderness breed (first herd 
book published in 1880) is said to have wholly 
descended from an imported bull and cow of Holder- 
ness stock from Yorkshire, England. 

The best pedigree for the poor man is performance. — John Tucker. 

Native. More than nine-tenths of the cows of 
the United States are so-called natives or scrubs. The 
latter term is widely used in the West and South ; the 

former is a better name, 
more applicable to a useful 
animal. 

Our native cow is the 
product of various Euro- 
pean importations. Cattle 
were brought here in 1609 
from the West Indies; in 1625 from Holland; in 1627 
from Sweden; in 1631 from Denmark. The old Den- 
marks were light yellow; the Dutch black and white; 
the Spanish and Welsh generally black; the Devons 
red. The latter were the foundation stock in some 
states. Denmark crossed with Spanish made a dark 




2o BIGGLE COW BOOK. 

brindle. Denmark and Devon made a light brindle. 
The Shorthorn blood enters largely into the native 
stock in many localities. Of course a mixed ancestry 
means an uncertain progeny. A valuable native cow 
may or may not produce a calf of equal merit, but a 
good thoroughbred bull will make a good calf a 
reasonable probability. 




SCRUBS. 

Breed with a purpose — a 5000 pound purpose 
at least. 

A poor butter cow may sometimes be used 
as a foster mother for calves. 

The polled (hornless) bulls are likely to 
produce hornless calves. 

Test the milk before buying the cow. 
A good pedigree will not atone for lack ot 
care. 
Animals are best imported at the age of one year. 
Away with all pensioners, all scrubs, all unprofitable 
boarders. 

A scrub with a pedigree is a worse scrub than the scrub 
without a pedigree. 

Milk quality is said to depend on breed, and milk quantity 
on feed. 

The worst kind of a scrub is a scrub milker. 




o 

V 



H 
m 

w 




Chapter III. 
THE BULL. 

The bull is half the herd.— Old Saying. 

To raise thoroughbreds is one 
thing ; to breed up a herd of native 
or grade cattle for dairy purposes 
or for beef is another thing. To 
succeed in the latter work requires 
a distinctly-defined purpose and an 
unwavering adherence to that purpose. 

The first thing is to get a good bull. The 
next is to know each cow of the herd mathemati- 
cally; to be certain of her yield in pounds and in butter 
fat. The removal of the unprofitable cow is a great 
step in the right direction. 

The selection of the bull should begin with the 
selection of his grandparents. He should be a 
thoroughbred and the offspring of good milkers. 

A heifer head on a bull is not the right sort. 
A bull should have a bull's head. 

The young bull is fit for service at sixteen 
months, but should be used the first year on not 
more than a dozen cows. The second year the 
number of cows may be doubled. 

It is far better to keep a really good, thoroughbred 
bull, and to charge $5 for his use, and thus limit him, 
than to charge only $1 for more frequent service. 

Bulls become dangerous, usually, because of 
unexpended muscular energy ; and light work adds 



22 BIGGLE COW BOOK. 

not only to their docility but to their prepotency. 
Exercise is not merely good for them, but actually 
necessary for their health, but do not let them run 
in the pasture with the cows, as most farmers do. 

The bull should be stabled apart from the cows 
with direct access to the service yard or pen. This 
should be surrounded by a high board fence. Do 
not keep him in solitary confinement in some dark, 
dirty pen. 

For work or for exercise a so-called one-horse 
power is a good machine ; and the 
bull's strength may be turned to use- 
ful account. Or the animal may 
be broken to harness, and made 
to draw a cart. But excessive 
work is as harmful as ex- 
Ill,- - cessive idleness. The age 
limit of usefulness is regula- 
ted by health and strength. 
how is this? Never trust a bull. It is 

the harmless bull that generally does harm, as it is 
the gun not loaded that kills. 



DON'T. 

Don't pet the bull. Don't trust even a muley. 

Don't deny the bull some sort of a gymnasium. 

Don't keep the scrub bull out of the beef barrel very long. 

Don't expect a bull to regard a fence as strong until he has 
failed to knock it down. 

Don't permit a snapping cur to worry the bull and frighten the 
cows. 

Don't defer dehorning the bull until he has killed somebody 
(as my neighbor did). 





Chapter IV. 
MOTHER COW. 

The cow is the personality of motherhood. Her owner should 
never forget this.— John Tucker. 

Whether it is better to 
raise cows or to buy them 
is an open question. Both 
plans are practised by suc- 
cessful dairymen. It is 
thought by some that it is 
better and cheaper to buy fresh cows from drovers, 
sell the calves, work the animals at high pressure as 
long as they yield a given amount of milk, and then 
sell them for what they will bring, replacing them 
with fresh cows from the drover. 

This plan has many advocates among good dairy- 
men; yet it has many objections in practice. 

The other method, that of raising the heifer calves, 
may or may not be more profitable, but it is certainly 
more scientific. Buying may demand more wit, but 
breeding demands more brains. 

The cow's period of pregnancy is slightly variable, 
but 280 days may be given as an average, with a few 
days additional in case of a male calf. The breeding 
period occurs at intervals of twenty or twenty-one days. 
Service in December or January will produce 
calves in September or October; and this is a very 
good time for the winter dairy. 



24 BIGGLE COW BOOK. 

The smaller breeds of cattle arrive at maturity earl- 
ier than the larger breeds. Jerseys have been bred at 
the age of seven months, but ten to fifteen months is bet- 
ter. This brings the heifer into profit at the age of two 
years. The heavy breeds reach maturity a year later. 
During pregnancy the heifer or cow should be 
well and wisely fed. The quantity must supply two 
lives; the quality must favor growth and development 
of the unborn calf, to say nothing of the milk supply. 
For some time before calving the food supply must be 
reduced. This is in recognition 
of the fact that the growth of 
the calf has been practically 
completed, that the milk yield 
is to cease, and that certain 
great changes are in progress. 
The nourishment of the foetus 
through the umbilical cord is 
her first born. to end, and the production of 
milk in the mammary glands is to begin. 

It is well for cows in milk to be dried off a 
month or six weeks before calving. This is best 
accomplished by cutting off the supply of milk-pro- 
ducing food and milking only once a day. Hay may 
be given freely, but not much grain. 

The birth of the calf is usually an event involving 
no especial pain or difficulty to the parent cow, but in 
the presence of alarming symptoms a veterinarian 
must be called in. Ordinarily it is safe to trust the 
whole operation to nature. 

Give each cow a box stall at least two weeks 
before calving, where she can be warm and quiet. 




MOTHER COW. 25 

The dam will lick dry her offspring and the calf 
will usually go to sucking of its own accord. The 
careful dairyman will, however, try to keep an eye 
on important events of this character, since accidents 
sometimes happen. 

The first milk of the cow is of a peculiar character. 
It is especially designed by nature to act as a pur- 
gative, and thus put the bowels of the young calf in 
perfect working condition. The first milk is called 
colostrum. 

It is advised by some dairymen not to milk the 
cow dry for a few days after calving, because by so 
doing, you cause an unnatural flow of the milk, and all 
sorts of complications ensue. 

The milk of the cow is generally considered fit for 
human food four days after the birth of the calf. 

A mature cow may safely drop a calf once a year, 
but a heifer should be allowed a considerable period 
of rest between the time of drop- 
ping her first calf and her next 
period of gestation. This rest 
will aid in her growth and ma- 
turity and will help to fix upon 
her character the habit of milk- Harriet's pet. 
ing. If the first calf is dropped when the heifer is two 
years old, let the next be dropped when she is three 
and a half years old. 

Warm water (90 ) is advisable for cows im- 
mediately after calving. A little bran in the water is 
often used; or bran may be given separately. The 
cow should be kept on dry straw, and should be 
allowed to come to her appetite very gradually. Com- 




26 



BIGGLE COW BOOK. 




WEDGE SHAPE. 



mon sense should be depended on largely during the 
critical period after calving. Avoid cold water, cold 
wind, wet bedding, overfeeding. Make the cow com- 
fortable, and watch her bag. If her bowels stubbornly 
fail to move, Epsom salts must be used. But it is 
better to have the cow in such good condition that 
nature will do most of the work. 

The term of a cow's usefulness is a thing of fact, 
not theory. High pres- 
sure will exhaust a cow 
in a few years. Good 
care will prolong her life. 
Drove cows are some- 
times worn out in three years, while home-bred cows 
may last three or four times as long. 

The accepted type of the milk cow is the wedge; 
that is, deep behind, with light shoulders and head. 

The accepted type of the beef cow is the parallel- 
ogram; that is, the " brick-set-on-edge" form. 

It must be borne in mind 
that each and every type of 
cow may be the best; no 
dairyman can judge for 
another dairyman. brick-set-on-edge type. 

Then, again, there are individual cows which 
differ in their products widely from the generally 
accepted family type, as certain Jerseys which pro- 
duce a great volume of milk and certain Holsteins 
which produce a heavy yield of butter. It shovys 
the possible power of the breeder over the animal. 
The important thing is to breed persistently for a 
definite purpose. 




MOTHER COW. 



27 




WELL-SET UDDER. 



The external cow is worthy of study as typical of 
merit or demerit. The head should be comparatively 
small and limbs slender. The 
neck should be rather long, in 
harmony with the idea of good 
grazing qualities. The back 
should be straight, eyes promi- 
nent and bright, belly large and 
deep, tail slender, udder large, 
teats large and set well apart, 
milk vein prominent, hair soft, 
and skin pliable. It is natural to 
expect a yellow skin inside the ear and on the extreme 
tip of the tail in all cows giving richly-colored milk. 
The color of the horns is not essential. 

The internal cow is no matter of fancy or fashion. 
She must have good teeth, good stomachs and a good 
udder. She may be a milk pro- 
ducer or a beef producer or a com- 
bination of the two ; but without 
digestive ability she is next to 
nothing. 

There was a theory quite widely 
promulgated a few years ago and 
not yet obsolete for judging the 
value of dairy cows by the so-called 
escutcheon or milk-mirror. It is 
called the Guenon theory. It de- 
pends upon a view of the rear of 
the udder and adjacent parts. A 
perfect escutcheon, indicative of a high grade dairy 
cow, demands a large udder to begin with, accom- 




ESCUTCHEON OF A 
GOOD BUTTER BULL. 



28 



BIGGLE COW BOOK. 



panied by certain growth and arrangement of the ad- 
jacent hair on the flanks. 

That there is something in the Guenon theory need 
not be denied; but if so good an authority as Governor 
Hoard says that it is of no practical use to him it is 
scarcely worth while to expect much of it in ordinary 
dairying. 

Dehorning cattle is now more or less widely prac- 
tised in the United States, and there are several horn- 
less breeds getting a wide foothold in the country. 




NO HORNS HERE 



Horns may be bred off altogether, after a time. It 
seems to be feasible to produce polled cattle of any 
desired type. 

Every dairy should have a milk standard, and 
every cow should come up to the standard or get out 
of the herd. A yearly product of 5000 pounds of 
milk is low enough; 6000 or 7000 pounds is better. 

Remember the old saying about the profits being 
in the top of the pail. 



MOTHER COW. 29 

COWSLIPS. 

The cow is not a race horse. 

Treat the nervous cow gently. 

A low voice makes a quiet cow. 

Do not water the cow in the icy creek. 

If 'tis currycomb for horse it should be currycomb for cow. 

A barbed-wire fence is a poor December wind-break for cows. 

Old advice but excellent : Speak to a cow as you would to a 
lady. 

More " Come, bossy," and less " Get around there." will fill the 
pail. 

The barking dog and the cow's heels should be kept wide 
apart. 

Let the cows pasture at night in fly-time; stable them in the 
daytime. 

The cow in heat should not be turned in the same pasture 
with the others. 

In buying a dairy cow from a dairyman, it is safe not to take 
the seller's pick. 

If the stable is cold at calving time blanket the cow after the 
birth of the calf, and the calf too. 

A cow's milk should amount each year to five times her own 
weight. Do not be contented with less. 

Which way does the hair stand on your cows? A cow that 
has to work for her food will return no profit. 

A carefully made test proves that in most cases excitement 
robs the milk of more than one-half its butter. 

Count no cow handsome that does not daily produce at least 
a one-pound print. Many cows are making two. 

It is a foolish notion to stint the rations of a dry cow. She 
needs to build up after a period of generous milking. 

Remember that bacteria swarm in the cellar as well as in the 
cow stable. A careless housekeeper is as blamable as a careless 
dairyman. 

Fat globules are small — millions to the quart. But do not be 
frightened ; they are weighed, not counted. Be sure to have 
at least 4^ pounds of them in every 100 pounds of milk. 

" The friendly cow all red and white, 
I love with all my heart ; 
She gives me cream with all her might 
To eat with apple-tart." 



Chapter V. 
BABY. 




Too much is expected of a calf a day old ; it does not know 
much ; how could it? — Harriet. 

True is it that if the calf is not 
fed suitable food and regularly it 
will not do its best. And if it fail 
to do its best as a calf its useful- 
ness when mature will be impaired. 
The best food for the calf is new milk, nature's own 
provision. When beginning life it needs a peculiar 
physic, gradually lessening in intensity the first few 
days. This the new-milch cow supplies, and it should 
be given the new calf, always. 

To teach the Baby to drink is easier than many 
suppose. A small quantity of milk and a large supply 
of patience and perseverance mixed are the requisites. 
Take a quart of milk in an eight or ten 
quart pail, give it two of your fingers to 
suck air between, and by degrees lower 
its nose into the pail, for by nature it 
points it skyward. After it finds it can 
draw milk instead of air between the fin- 
gers it will not be long in relaxing its 
neck muscles. After a little it may be 
weaned from the fingers. If it will not drink at first 
it must be left for a few hours to increase its appetite 




32 BIGGLE COW BOOK. 

If new milk cannot be spared after three days, 
skimmilk may be substituted, but this must be done 
judiciously, particularly at first. A sudden change 
from new milk to a substitute must not be made. A 
half-pint of skimmilk must be put in the mess, and day 
by day it must be increased until skimmilk is fed 
entirely. It is well also to change the calf from sweet 




FEEDING THE CALVES. 

to sour milk, particularly if it is to be reared during 
hot weather when it is not always possible to keep the 
milk sweet. Calves fed on sour milk do as well as 
those reared on sweet milk, and run no risk of several 
of the diseases incident to calfhood. Changing from 
one to the other is a fertile source of trouble. 

Good calves may be raised on buttermilk alone, 
but they should not run to grass while living upon it, 
hay being kept by them, thus avoiding the prevalence 
of scours. It is best to give calves some liquid food 
from the pail, for at least three months. Besides this 
they should learn to eat as soon as possible, when a 
little middlings in a shallow trough may be given 
daily, together with other food. 

Where it is not convenient to get milk to raise a 
calf it may be brought up successfully on hay tea. 
Boil cut clover hay in water until its strength is 



BABY. 33 

extracted. Wean the calf from milk to this tea pre- 
cisely as if it were skimmilk. Whatever the food, 
however, remember there is more danger in overfeed- 
ing than in underfeeding. Too much is usually the 
cause of that enemy of the calf, scours or diarrhoea, as 
a remedy for which nothing equals starvation. But 
prevention is far better than cure; and never lose sight 
of the axiom that a growing animal should never be 
allowed to stop growth until matured in the most 
thorough manner. Never fatten a young animal you 
expect to raise. 

To make veal in the simplest manner is to let the 
calf suck or to feed the warm or new milk five to eight 
weeks. But this is also the most expensive 
way. To sell butter fats and at the same 
time sell veal requires a stroke of genius, 
but some are doing it to their great 
profit and satisfaction. A calf must 
be a prodigy to pay fifteen to twenty 
cents per pound for butter fats, and 
c aly rich men can afford to feed such 
expensive foods. vet. 

A common practice is to replace cream with flax- 
seed jelly ; that is to feed calves with skimmilk to 
which flaxseed jelly has been added. Of the jelly use 
half a teacupful in the milk at each meal, increasing it 
slowly until a pint is fed in the skimmilk twice per 
day. To make the jelly, boil one pound of whole flax- 
seed in water until a thick paste results. It needs no 
straining, and only to be kept cold while it lasts. 
Some have good results by carefully using corn meal 
or oat meal instead of the flaxseed. 




34 BIGGLE COW BOOK. 

When feeding grain to calves in connection with 
skimmilk, a little point worth remembering is to put 
the grain in the pail after pouring in the milk. It 
seems to mix better with the milk than if put in the 
bottom of the pail and the milk poured on top of it. 

The most profitable veal is made in four to five 
weeks, every added day after this increasing the cost 
per pound rapidly. 

Fall calves have a distinct advantage over calves 
beginning life in the spring. Given warm, clean quar- 
ters and better care than the hurry of the summer will 
permit, they become strong and their digestion lusty 
before the season when flies annoy and the sun be- 
comes too hot for comfort. Such calves dropped in 
the early fall and given the right of way all winter 
resemble, in the spring, yearlings dropped the previous 
spring. 

CALF WISDOM. 

Skimmilk has nearly all the protein of the new milk ; and 
protein is the muscle and tissue builder. 

Good calves are real mortgage 
lifters. 

Feed no mouldy hay or grain to 
calves. 

Coax the calves ; make pets of 
them. 

Teach the calf to lead. * RAv ' 

Keep the baby dry. shelter for calves. 

The new calf will begin to eat hay at a week old. You 
couldn't do it. 

The infant should be a little hungry three times a day. 

Keep the young calves in pens separate from the older ones. 







Chapter VI. 
THE HEIFER. 

You can grow a better cow during the first two years of a 
calf's life than in all the time after that. — Tim. 

w ^^^ It is quite as important to feed 

Jl~^~ m ^B a we ^"balanced ration to a heifer 

^^^SF^talP '"fl as to a cow * n m ^- ^ balanced 

.^IJj^Kig^ i?S ration is not a theory but a way 

mJ of making every food unit count 

for the utmost. About 1:4.8 is 

right for the heifer; rich in protein because the animal 

is forming tissue rapidly. 

You can't win a heifer without wooing her ; and 
unless she confides in you there is trouble ahead. Pet 
her every day now, and you will gain time and milk 
and save vexation when she calves. 

Be careful not to dry the young cows in milk when 
stabling them for the winter. Milk them clean, pam- 
per their appetites and be good to them. If they will 
milk right through to calving, all the better. A heifer 
easily learns to dry off early, and will ever after re- 
member the trick. When mature she will be profitable 
eleven months in the year, when she might be kept at 
a loss if dry three to five months. 

The wrinkles grow on the horns of cattle when 
they are going on three years of age, and when three 
years old there is generally one well defined wrinkle 



3& 



BIGGLE COW BOOK. 



around the horns close to the head. The next year 
there are two, and one additional every year. These 
wrinkles denote the age, counting the first one three. 




A PRETTY PARTY. 

When calves are born in the autumn and stunted, the 
wrinkles get out of order and are not reliable as to 
age. On well raised calves the rule is about certain. 



FRISKIES. 

To scratch a nervous heifer between her fore legs has a won* 
derfully soothing effect. 

A cow well broken to the halter, and gentle, is worth much 
more than one that is unmanageable. 

Do not permit heifers to be worried, alarmed or annoyed. 

Heifers are timid. They need reassurance. 

The well-fed, well-stabled, well-trained heifer literally grows 
into money. 

Have heifers that are worth raising, and then treat them 
accordingly. 

The Jersey heifer becomes a cow at two years of age, and is 
then self-supporting. 



Chapter VII. 



THE OX. 




There is no richer autumn picture than an ox-cart loaded 
with golden corn. — Harriet. 

Let us train the steers ; go at it 
gently, one at a time. August is a 
• good time to select or match up steers 
and to train them. Any odd times 
when work is not pressing may thus be made profit- 
able. Put him on the barn floor if you have no other 
place. Take a whip with a long stock and a short lash 
and stand in the middle of the floor and drive the 
steer around you. Never strike him a hard blow. 
Tell him to go on, and let him go on till he goes around 
well. Then teach him to stop at the word whoa. 

When the word is given touch him on the forehead 
with the whip rapidly until he stops; then brush him a 
little and give him a nubbin of corn. Kindness goes 
a great ways. Keep 
him from getting exci- 
ted. You can do nothing 
with a crazy steer. Give 
one lesson a day to each 
steer. 

The second day teach 
him to haw. This is done 
by first stopping him as 
before, and then gently 
tapping him on the off hip, 




A FAMOUS YOKE. " JOE " AND 
JERRY." TOTAL WEIGHT 73OO LBS. 

Reverse this training 



38 



BIGGLE COW BOOK. 



to gee and walk around his head to turn him. After 
each steer, by itself, has learned these rudiments of its 
education, then put them both together in the yoke in 
the same place and do not let them run, but walk 
around together. Teach them to stop together at the 
word, to haw and gee, and back up. This lesson should 
be taught singly and a day taken for it. Some people 
try to teach a steer everything in one day, and then 
make them used to the yoke, and make runaways of 
them at the same time, by putting the yoke on them and 
letting them run. When thus broken oxen can never be 
depended upon. They will get excited easily and away 
they will go pell-mell and nothing can stop them. 




GADS. 

Older than the Pyramids is the use of the ox. 

The ox, though not swift, is pretty sure. 

The man who has never used a good yoke of oxen has never 
fully enjoyed farm life. 

Little yokes for little oxen ; big yokes for big oxen. 

If the oxen are the least bit thin feed them up well before 
plowing time. It will pay. 

Do you notice how well good Devon steers sell when well 
broken ? 

Shoes are indispensable to oxen during icy terms, and are 
profitable insurance against accident. 

Abandon the barbarous ox-yoke and use a 
harness like the accompanying cut. The pa- 
tient ox will be more useful and will do much 
more work in this humane outfit, and be free 
from galls and sores. 





Chapter VIII. 
FOOD AND DRINK. 

Profits are near the top of the milk pail — Dorothy Tucker. 

Water cows after feeding. 
Feed regularly what each cow will 
eat up clean, always giving the heaviest 
feeding at night. 

It is easier to keep a cow in a 
profitable condition, than to get her 
a good milk back to it if allowed to run down. 
machine. Do not let the cows eat horse 

manure; it will make the butter bitter. 

A little linseed meal keeps the intestines of all stock 
open, and they thrive better as a result. 

The cow's stomach is a mighty poor filter for 
filthy water. 

No single food is calculated for a complete butter 
food. Clover hay comes the nearest to a complete 
butter food. 

This chapter is on food and drink, but it should be 
understood at the outset that big results are impossible 
with poor cows. There must be a high standard of 
productive ability and the pensioners must go. There 
must be a thoroughbred bull or the dairy will not in- 
crease in output from year to year, but will remain 
stationary, or will retrograde. 

The American dairyman is blessed with a long list 
of available cattle foods, but his best policy is always 



40 BIGGLE COW BOOK. 

to use his home products as a feeding basis, buying 
only what is necessary to balance the ration. 

The phrases nutritive ratio, well balanced ration, 
etc., are not hard to understand for those who try. 

The agricultural chemist has learned that the tis- 
sue-producing elements of the food must bear a cer- 
tain proportion to the energy and heat-producing ele- 
ments of the food. This proportion is called the 
nutritive ratio. It should be as one to five and one- 
half, or one to six, varying with age, etc. Destroy 
or ignore this proportion and there is a loss of money, 
and good food goes to the dung pile, undigested and 
wasted. 

Speaking technically, the elements in cattle feeds 
are protein, carbohydrates, fats, fibre, ash, water, etc. 
We are concerned with the first three; and the digest- 
ible protein must be in the proportion of one to five, 
or one to six, as compared with the sum of the digest- 
ible carbohydrates and fats. The dairyman need not 
concern himself about fibre, ash, water, etc. They 
are always present. 

Protein is a name applied to a group of nitrogen- 
ous substances. It furnishes, in brief, the material 
for tissue building. It enters largely into the muscles, 
blood, milk, tendons, nerves, skin, hair, wool. It also 
has some heat-producing power, but it is mainly a 
maker of tissue. 

The carbohydrates (sugars, starches, gums) and 
the fats have to do with building up the fat of animals, 
and are necessary for the production of heat and the 
maintenance of energy and motion. Their heat-pro- 
ducing power is measured in calories. A calory is the 



FOOD AND DRINK. 



41 



amount of heat required to raise the temperature of a 
pound of water four degrees Fahrenheit. 

The protein makes the engine and the boiler; the 
carbohydrates and fat are the fuel. 

Fat is reckoned to be worth two and one-quarter 
times the carbohydrates in ability to produce heat 
and motive power within the body. 

Nutritive ratio is merely the proportion of protein 
to carbohydrates plus fat; the fat being multiplied by 
two and one-quarter and added to the carbohydrates. 

Tables of the digestible ingredients of all feed- 
ing stuffs are now published by the Government 
and by most of the stations, and can be had free 
of cost. Every dairyman should have such tables 
at hand for frequent reference. It is not hard to learn 
to use them. 

American dairy practice differs slightly from Euro- 
pean practice, but it is believed that the latter (the 
German standard of Wolff) is more nearly correct. 
Here are two standards, each intended to represent 
the daily food of a cow weighing 1000 pounds. 



Total 
Organic 
Matter 



Digestible Di g** le Digestible 
Protein hydrates Fat 



German (Wolff's) 24 lbs. 2.50 lbs. 12.50 lbs. .40 lbs. 29,590 
Wisconsin 24.5ilbs. 2.15 lbs. 13.27 lbs. . 74 lbs. 31,250 



Fuel 

Value 

(Calories) 



The first standard is based upon experience and 
science. The second (Wisconsin) merely represents 
the average practice of 128 successful American dairy- 
men. The German standard ratio is written 1:5.4. 
The Wisconsin standard ratio is 1 : 6.9, and is regarded 
as a little too wide; that is, rather excessive in carbo- 



42 BIGGLE COW BOOK. 

hydrates; not quite enough protein. When the protein 
is in excess the ration is said to be too narrow. 

Dairymen need not use technical terms, but it is 
obvious that they must know what a good ration really 
is, and why it is good. 

Of course either of the above rations must be in- 
creased or decreased in weight as the animal weighs 
more or less than iooo pounds. 

Dairymen about to make up rations must take full 
account of home-grown products. Whatever the farm 
produces best and cheapest must be made the basis of 
the dairy ration. It may be necessary to buy some- 
thing to effect a " balance," but the necessity 
for outside purchases is decreasing as dairy- 
men better understand what the ration really 
demands and what the farm may 
supply. Protein is the article in which 
the coarse fodders are generally defi- 
cient, and protein is the most expen- 

BACK FROM THE ' ^ „ « , 

dairy school. sive thing to buy. It is usually bought 
in linseed meal, gluten meal, cottonseed meal, bran, 
etc. ; and yet it can be easily grown at home in the 
form of peas, soja beans, vetches, tares, clovers, etc. 
Protein is nitrogen in combination. 

An almost perfectly balanced ration can be made 
of these plants, in the form of hay, and if fed with a 
small amount of grain for the sake of palatability they 
can be made to save part of the cost of going to mill. 

The following standards are the best now access- 
ible to American dairymen. Balanced rations can 
easily be made corresponding with them. The total 
weight of ration is important, and must correspond 




FOOD AND DRINK. 



43 



with weight of animal ; the weight of protein is impor- 
tant; but the carbohydrates and fats may be varied 
slightly, provided their sum total (with fat multiplied 
by two and one-quarter) be about five and a half 
times the weight of protein, since carbohydrates and 
fat serve substantially the same purpose in the food. 
In working with tables, in making up rations, 
it is necessary to observe the terms "dry matter," 
"digestible protein," "digestible carbohydrates," "di- 
gestible fat;" for these terms are intended in the 
Wolff standard. (The total weight of a cow's ration 
of twenty-four pounds of dry matter varies greatly. 
The dry matter in ioo pounds of ensilage amounts to 
only about twenty pounds, while in ioo pounds of good 
hay the dry matter amounts to nearly ninety pounds. ) 





D cd 


u 


Digestible 








> u 


'fl?* J 


Food 






WolfFs (German) 


3* 

<v 53 


O CJ 


Materials 


"3 .Si 

> ^ 




Feeding 




tn 




Standards 


2^ 


^2c 


"53 


62 


to 


Z. £ 




per Day 


lbs. 







U 1h 


P U 

fe ^ 


z 




lbs. 


lbs. 


lbs. 


lbs. 






Milk Cows 


1000 


24.0 


25 


12.5 


.40 


29,590 


1:5-4 


Growing Cattle, 2 to 3mos. 


150 


3-3 


0.6 


2 1 


•30 


5,i l6 


I 


4.6 


" " 3 to 6mos. 


300 


7.0 


1.0 


4.1 


•30 


10,750 


I 


4.8 


" 6toi2mos. 


500 


12.0 


i-3 


6.8 


•30 


16,332 


I 


58 


" i2toi8mos. 


700 


16.8 


1 4 


9.1 


.28 


20,712 


I 


6.9 


" " i8t024mos. 


850 


20 4 


1.4 


10.3 


.26 


22,859 


I 


7.8 


Fattening Steers, ist period, 


1000 


27.0 


2-5 


15° 


•50 


34,660 


I 


6.4 


2d period, 


1000 


26.0 


3-o 


14.8 .70 


36,062 


I 


5-5 


" 3d period, 


1000 


• 25.0 


2.7 


14.8 | .60 


35,o82 


I 


6.0 


Oxen moderately worked 


1000 


24.0 


1.6 


ii*3l -3o 


24,260 


I 


74 



Note. — Weight of ration up to 1000 pounds is actual; above 
1000 pounds the weight of ration must be proportionably in- 
creased. It will be noticed that the ratio of protein to carbohy- 
drates and fats changes under different conditions, ages, etc. 



44 



BIGGLK COW BOOK. 



To show the makeup of a good dairy ration (for 
a cow weighing iooo pounds), and to point out the 
difference between actual weight and ' ' total dry mat- 
ter," a single example may be given. Any dairyman 
can adapt a ration to his individual needs. It is an 
easy, pleasant and profitable pastime. The printed 
tables, as already stated, can be had free of cost from 
the nearest experiment station or from the Agricultural 
Department at Washington. 



Ration for Dairy Cows 


>> 

Q v 

lbs. 


<v 

3.5 

(A -£ 
<L> O 

.^£ 

Q 
lbs. 


_ Digestible 
g* Carbo- 
hydrates 


3 

be ^ 

s 

lbs. 


3 en 

■5 .2 

> s 

a 


12 pounds clover hay .... 
20 pounds corn silage .... 

4 pounds corn meal .... 

4 pounds wheat bran .... 

4 pounds gluten meal . . 


io. 16 

4.18 
340 
3-54 
3-69 


•79 
.11 

.28 
.48 
.82 


4.24 
2.36 
2.61 
1.65 
i-75 


.20 
•13 
•13 
.11 

•34 


10,199 
5,H3 
5,921 
4,446 
6,223 


Total 

Wolff's Standard . . . 


24.97 
24.00 


2.48 
2.50 


12.61 
12.50 


.91 
.40 


31,932 
29,590 



This ration is not offered as a model of economy. 
In some locations it would be excellent; in other places 
it would be too expensive. It shows the proper weight 
of dry matter and nearly the proper proportion of pro- 
tein to carbohydrates and fat for a cow in milk. The 
nutritive ratio is about 1 : 5.9, which is a trifle too wide. 
Still, it would be a good ration. 

As to feeding stuffs (aside from natural pasture) 
the American range is very large. The green fodders 
embrace the whole list of grasses, sorghums, millets 
and leguminous plants. The latter group (including 
clovers, peas, beans, vetches, tares) is destined to play 



FOOD AND DRINK. 45 

an important part in dairying, as well as in green 
manuring, on account of their wonderful ability to take 
nitrogen from the atmosphere. They are adapted to 
silage as well as to soiling purposes. Ambitious Amer- 
ican dairymen would do well to give full attention to 
the leguminous plants, as there is money in them both 
as soil enrichers and as economic stock foods. 

Corn fodder, both green and dry, is of great eco- 
nomic importance to dairymen. It adds necessary 
bulk to the ration, whether used dry or in the form of 
ensilage. There are various good implements on the 
market for cutting and shredding dry fodder, to make 
it more available for stock feeding purposes. 

Ensilage and root crops are briefly treated in other 
chapters. The former has become essential, even in 
comparatively small dairies. The latter source of suc- 
culent food is worthy of increased attention ; especially 
carrots, mangels and sugar beets. 

Grain is sometimes, not always, too expensive to 
feed to dairy cattle. Wheat occasionally drops in price 
to a point where it can be fed to advantage. Oats is 
an excellent cow food, when ground and used as a 
component of a ration. Corn fed whole is largely 
wasted; and, indeed, it is often wasted when fed in the 
form of meal in a poorly balanced ration. It is a heat- 
producer rather than a milk maker. When the starch 
has been taken out, making gluten meal of it, it is 
quite a different article, as it is less heating, and has a 
higher percentage of protein. 




Chapter IX. 
FOOD AND DRINK— Continued. 

You can lead a cow to water, but the other cows may keep het 
from drinking. — John Tucker. 

A word as to the drink 
I of the dairy cow, after which 
1 1 will return to the food ques- 
tion. 

Careful experiments 
show that cows will sometimes drink as much as 
seventy-five to one hundred and fifty pounds of water 
per day if they have free access to it. The average 
cow will perhaps drink ninety pounds, or say nearly 
enough to fill a forty quart can every day. 

To cut off the water supply is to cut off the milk 
supply; and everybody knows how the master cows 
intimidate the weaklings, and sometimes frighten them 
away from the drinking trough. 

The arguments are good for having water within 
reach of every cow as she stands in her stall. In this 
way the timid animal is sure to get her fill. 

The cow's drinking water must be perfectly pure 
and preferably cool ; cool enough to be palatable and 
pure because much of the drink goes direct to the milk 
pail. This is the legitimate way of watering milk. 
Eighty-seven per cent, of milk being water, let it be 
good water. 

The judgment of a cow as to pure drinking water 
is not to be trusted. 



48 BIGGLE COW BOOK. 

Returning to the subject of foods, I must speak of 
ensilage, a thing now indispensable in profitable dairy- 
ing, on account of excellence and cheapness. 

Corn is the main ensilage crop in America. It 
gains nothing by going through the silo, but neither 
does it lose anything, and herein lies the profit. The 
corn-stalks may perhaps gain somewhat in digest- 
ibility ; but the great end secured is a permanent 
supply of succulent food. It is as though the farmer 
could bring to his cows freshly-grown corn-stalks 
all winter. 

The daily amount for a dairy cow is one uuoic foot 
of settled silage, weighing thirty-five to forty pounds. 
Some feeders use fifty pounds, but a cubic foot is prob- 
ably quite enough. 

On this basis it is easy to figure out the size of a 
contemplated silo. The cows will be stall-fed for say 
200 days. It is therefore necessary to multiply 200 cubic 
feet by the number of cows in the herd to learn the 
requisite size of the silo. Or, stated in other terms, 
an allowance may be made of four tons of silage per 
cow per year. 

A good wooden silo (perfectly round) can 
be erected at an estimated cost of $1.25 to $2 
per ton capacity. The cost of ensilage will 
of course vary, but $1.50 per ton may be quoted 
as an average. 

Three tons of ensilage are approximately round 
equal in carbohydrates and fat to a ton of red silo. 
clover hay; but the protein is deficient, and must be 
supplied in the form of bran or some other nitrogen- 
bearing food. 




FOOD AND DRINK. 49 

Ensilage should be fed gradually at first, and after- 
ward only as part of a well-balanced ration. When in- 
telligently fed it is one of the most excellent and eco- 
nomical foods within reach of the practical dairyman. 

Future dairying will no doubt involve the use of 
peas, beans and other leguminous plants for silage, on 
account of the high percentage of protein which they 
contain. Leading stock feeders are aware of the eco- 
nomic value of these plants, and are beginning to use 
them in ration making. 

Of the many commercial articles available for 
balancing cattle rations and supplying protein ( in which 
ensilage and the coarse fodders are usually deficient) 
the more common are linseed or cake meal, cottonseed 
meal, gluten, glucose, brewers' grains, wheat bran, 
wheat shorts, etc. 

These mill feeds are produced in such great num- 
bers, and under so many names, that it is impossible for 
me even to enumerate them in this little book. The 
proper thing for a stock feeder to do is to get the tabu- 
lated bulletins of the stations, and study the ingredients 
of these foods in connection with their commercial cost. 

The nutritive ratio of potatoes is about i : 12. A 
good cow food can be made by the addition of cotton- 
seed meal, bran, or other protein-bearing ingredient. 
The advisability of feeding potatoes is largely a ques- 
tion of economy, depending on market price. 

Cottonseed meal, a by-product of the manufacture 
of cottonseed oil, is very rich in protein. 

Linseed meal, old process, is the by-product of 
removing the oil of flaxseed by pressure. Linseed 
meal, new process, is the result of removing the oil by 



50 BIGGLE COW BOOK. 

solvents. The latter contains a higher percentage of 
protein. 

As to cooking or steaming food for cattle, there is 
little to recommend the practice except in case of 
fodders where the palatability is increased by the 
operation. 

It is good practice, however, to cut hay and fod- 
der, and sprinkle meal over it, and moisten with water, 
and then mix thoroughly in a trough prepared for the 
purpose. This makes a large bulk of palatable and 
nutritious material. 

And do not forget the salt. 

Yet, after all, June pasturage is the 
ideal cow food. It possesses succu- 
lence, volume, nutrition. The nutritive 
ratio of Kentucky blue grass (green 
grass) is about i: 7, and of red clover short pasture. 
about 1:5. Together they make rich pasturage. 

The ration fed in the stable may be made as pala- 
table, as succulent, and as productive of milk as the 
best pasture of early summer. 

When no pasture can be provided for the calves, 
they can be picketed so as to have plenty of feed with- 
out too cumbersome a rope, by having two picket pins 
joined by a smooth wire, to which 

/<( \£$> by means of a swivel is attached 

the calf's rope so that it will slip on 

^ A o the wire. When new grass is nec- 





essary move the picket pins alter- 
nately. The length of the wire will determine the 
size of the grazing space. 



FOOD AND DRINK. 



51 



A FEW ANALYSES. 
Dry Matter and Digestible Food Ingredients in 100 pounds. 



Wheat bran 

Corn meal 

Oats 

Gluten meal 

Hominy chops ... 

Malt sprouts 

Brewers' grains (dry) 
Cottonseed meal 
Linseed meal, n. p. . 

Clover hay 

Timothy hay . . . . , 

Mixed hay , 

Ensilage (corn) . . . , 
Corn fodder .... 

Potatoes 

Beets 

Turnips , 

Man gels 



Drv 


Protein 


Matter 




lbs. 


lbs. 


88.5 


12.01 


85.0 


7.01 


89.0 


9-25 


91.2 


2549 


88.9 


7-45 


89.8 


18.72 


91. 1 


14-73 


91.8 


37-oi 


89.8 


27.89 


84.7 


6.58 


86.8 


2.89 


S7.1 


4.22 


20.9 


06 


57-8 


2.48 


21. 1 


1.27 


13.0 


1. 21 


9-5 


.81 


9-1 


1.03 



Carbo- 
hydrates 
lbs. 



41.23 
65.20 

48.34 
42.32 

55-24 

43-5Q 

36.60 

16.52 

36.36 

35-35 

43-72 

43.26 

11.79 

33-38 

15-59 

8.84 

6.46 

5-65 



Fat 
lbs. 



Fuel 
Value 



2.87 
3-25 
4.18 

10.38 
6.81 
1. 16 
4.82 

12.58 

2-73 
1.66 

*-.43 

1-33 ! 

.65 

.05 



111,138 
148,026 

124,757 

169,930 

I45'342 

120,624 

115-814 

152,653 

131,026 

84,995 

92,729 

93,925 

25,7H 

7i,554 

31,360 

18,904 

13,986 

12,888 



MIXED FEED. 

Well-cured clover hay and some good yellow carrots— nothing 
better for coloring butter. 

Make a balanced ration (as near as may be) from home-grown 
products. Cut down the bill for mill feed. ' 
Clover hay is the dairyman's mainstay. 
Chopped apples and bran; try them. 
Feed most what you can grow best. 
All radical food changes must be made gradually. 
Eight or ten cows will warrant a silo ; preferably a round one. 
The best cows drink the most ; washy foods make washy milk. 
Many a so-so cow can be made extra good with more food. 
Never turn the stock out the first time when the grass is wet. 
It may cause hoven or bloat. 

A yell stops digestion and secretion. 

"Where the bubbling water flows 
As it through the meadow goes, 
Where the grass is fresh and fine, 
Pretty cow, go there and dine." 



Chapter X. 
THE BARN. 

People who winter their cows out of doors on straw or poor 
hay, are the ones who complain of hollow horn, and make this the 
excuse for the wretched condition of their cattle. Got the hollow 
horn ! It would be the truth to say, got the hollow belly. — John 
Tucker. 

The location and construction of farm buildings 
always depend so greatly upon conditions that there 
can be no arbitrary rules. If the side of a hill with 
south or east exposure can be secured, a gravity barn 
may be built that will greatly save time and facilitate 
the doing of chores. Occasionally a barn is made with 
driveway into the gable, and thus all the hay and 
silage are pitched down into bay or silo and down into 
stable, the manure also going down into the cellar on 
cart placed there. For storage barns the modern ten- 
dency is for buildings of great height, to utilize as 
much space as possible under small roof area, and to 
build stock barns but one story to gain more light and 
better ventilation. 

To use the horse fork, which is a great time and 
labor saver in barns on level ground, all 
cross works should be avoided by the^ 
truss system shown in Fig. i. This brings 
but trifling increase of cost and greater 
strength. With a barn built so, the mows 
may be laid out where one desires, and FIG> r / y 
when empty the floor is clear from end to end. A silo 




54 



BIGGLE COW BOOK. 



The building 
4 adaptation 
Erected 




could be put in at one end if desired, 
shown herewith illustrates an ingenious 
of an old plan to modern requirements 
with basement to the yard, as 
was very common formerly, the 
basement to serve for 
stabling or manure, a 
cow stable of ten feet 
posts has been placed 
in the yard. This per- 
mits the little door at the end of the 
store barn floor to be used as a chute, through which 
the hay and stalks are passed to the cement floor of the 
new stable. Then if that modern necessity in profitable 
dairying, the silo, be adopted, and it is thought best to 
place it in a part of the discarded basement, the ensilage 
is handed into the stable very easily on car or barrow. 
The plank barn is becoming very popular in parts 
of the west. It is made entirely without heavy timbers, 
plank being spiked or bolted together to make the 
varying thicknesses required. It is made to break joints 
carefully, and any length of beam or truss is thus se- 
cured. Such timbers are easily shaped and prove 
superior in strength to solid beams. Roofs nearly oval 
or dome shape, and of great strength, may be made 
that render a barn remarkably capa- 
cious. What applies to barns is true 
, also for silos. This principle in building 
doubtless has a great future. 

This is a single illustration of sev- 
eral styles of bents of plank barns. The 
outer, stack-like shape is made of plank and supports 




THE BARN. 



55 




the girts, to which the covering is nailed. The other 
work is made in the same way of planks of more or 
less thicknesses, these bolted together to form power- 
ful trusses at each bent. 

In many barns now existing the stalls for the cattle 
are allowed too little space, or more properly the stalls 
cut into space that ought to be left behind the cattle 
for a manure ditch and a raised walk. The 
illustration shows how such a difficulty may 
be remedied where existing, and how new 
barns may economize space — a desirable fea- 
ture. The catties' standing floor is 
moved forward to the edge of the 
feeding floor, with a solid partition 
between. A part of this par- = ^ 
tition is arranged, however, to open down on hinges 
and be held by a chain, to form a crib for the cattle, 
upright poles being arranged to hold the hay from slip- 
ping down under their feet, but far enough apart to 
allow the cattle to feed through them. All that is 
required is that they may be able to get their noses 
through, as the hay will keep constantly slipping toward 
them as eaten. When the feed is eaten, and at night 
in particular, this crib can be shut up out of the way, 
making the stalls very warm indeed. For feeding grain, 
ensilage or roots a feed box is provided that slips 
through the partition in front of each animal, and is re- 
moved when empty. A feed box should be provided 
for each stall. The boxes can then be gathered, filled 
and wheeled on a truck or barrow to the cribs. 

Manure is worthy of good care. One of the best 
cheap shelters is shown in the sketch. It is a lean-to 



56 



BIGGLE COW BOOK. 





by the side of the barn built wide enough to back the 
wagons into or drive through for loading when hauling 
out manure. Or it may shelter carts 
into which the stable clearing is done di- 
rect, thus saving one handling. Outside 
drop-boarding will be noticed. This is 
in ten feet sections, hinged at A, and isu| W 
to keep out cold from the barn at night I 
and let in light by day as well as to ven--|j 
tilate the manure. A drain may run 
from the stable into this manure storage room there 
to be absorbed. 

Here is a good plan for the floor of stall. The 
dotted portion represents the ce- 
"ggyj ment, while the rest is of wood. 
iBi It will be seen that the fore feet of 
the cattle stand upon plank, laid cross-wise to keep 
the cattle from slipping when reaching for their fodder. 
An unbroken surface of cement extends from this back 
over the platform, down about the inside of the manure 
gutter and up to the floor of the walk. This projects 
over the cement to protect the edge of the latter. 

In constructing the manure gutter it should be 
placed nearer the feed-box or trough at one end of the 
row of stalls than the other, to accommodate cows of 
different lengths, and the stalls will vary in width from 
four and one-half to five and one-half feet. 

A cement floor for the cow stable is durable, easily 
cleaned and cheapest eventually. How to lay it is no 
secret, but many go wrong, lacking the knowledge. 
First buy the best cement — Portland, although it costs 
most, goes three times as far as the same money in 



THE BARN. 57 

cheap cement. To one barrel of Portland use eight 
barrels of gravel or sand and broken stone, measuring 
and not guessing. Then mix thoroughly, three times, 
before wetting. Pour on no water but sprinkle with a 
watering-pot as the third mixing is being done. Only 
moisten, don't wet it. Have it just so it will retain its 
shape when a little is pressed in the hand. Have the 
foundation ready in advance. If you can get stone 
stand it on edge six inches deep and pound it all hard. 
Or use six inches of gravel tamped solid. Then set up 
edge pieces to lay a strip three to four feet wide and 
pour in the concrete four inches, two inches at a time, 
tamping it solid each time. On top make a surface 
of cement half inch thick ; cement one part, sand 
(screened) two parts. Each layer must dry slowly, 
under repeated sprinkling, for three days. 

One of the useful things on the stock farm is an 
elevated walk from the barn floor out over the feed 
yard. A row of racks is made beneath the walk. The 
hay is easily carried, a forkful at a time, and dropped 
into these racks, from which it is eaten by the cattle in 
the sun at noonday. 

COMFORTABLES. 

Cows need much water, but not in the form of cold autumn 
rains. 

Do not turn cows out in a cold wind for exercise. The animal 
heat is wasted. 

No live stock more than cows better appreciate dry bedding. 

Thirty-cent butter is too costly to use for filling the cracks in 
the walls of the cow stable. 

Gilt-edged butter cannot be made when the cows are kept in a 
dark, foul smelling, poorly ventilated stable. 

While we must wake up and get the out-door idea out of our 
heads, we ought not keep the cows too closely confined or too warm. 
A happy medium in this matter is required. 




Q 

Qi 

W 
X 

W 
K 
h 

O 

< 

K 

Q 
O 
O 

o 



Chapter XI. 
STABLE REQUISITES. 

To save steps is to save 7>ien and wages. — Tim. 

The ideal stall has a floor level, or nearly level. 
The cow may be fastened with a chain or with the New- 
ton tie. I do not like stanchions. It is desirable to have 
but little forward and backward freedom of motion 
lest the droppings foul the cow's hinder parts, includ- 
ing the udder, when she lies down. 

A useful device for adding to the comfort of the 
cow and the cleanliness of her products is the curry 
comb. Do not forget it, please. If there is horse food 
in a curry comb there is also cow food. A clean skin 
and brisk circulation of blood is quite as essential in 
the milker as in the trotter. 

Drinking troughs or tanks in front of every stall, 
or every other stall, are to be recommended. They 
pay. 

A trough or tub of water standing all day under 
the rays of the summer sun, becomes very unpalatable 
for cattle. An automatic arrangement for keeping 
water cool is shown in the cut. A loose cover is sus- 
pended over the trough by ropes. Cattle 
and horses will quickly learn to press this 
aside and drink, when the cover will come 
back over the water again. Make the 
cover light and support it evenly as shown. 

The cattle should not be allowed to drink ice cold 




60 BIGGLE COW BOOK. 

water. A trough may be hung on a pivot, just above 
the centre as shown here, so that upon a 
cold day the water can be dumped out 
after the stock are watered. 






Where ground feed is given to stock much labor 
and time are wasted unless it is all prepared at once and 
all fed out of the same receptacle. A handy barrow 
for this purpose is shown herewith. It is 
I water-tight so that all the feed can be mixed 
in it, wheeled along in front of the stock and each one 
given its ration. 

A good milking stool has a seat and a g*"N 
table for the pail to rest on. It is eighteen ^^JjUL — ^ 
inches long, ten inches wide and thirteen *r *>& 

inches in height, as shown here. 

One of the requisites aside from clean udders and 
cleanly milkers is a good milk strainer. 

There is need for some kind of a power and some 
kind of a cutter or shredder on every dairy farm. 
There is less waste of coarse stuff when cut than when 
uncut. It can be flavored with meal, and the cows 
will consume a great deal more of it when thus pre- 
pared. Besides, the ration can be better controlled, 
better weighed, and better balanced where the cutter 
is used. A mixing trough, where cut hay and fodder 
can be mixed with meal and moisture, has a place in 
all large cow stables. 

A feeding stand for calves is handy for the pen or 
field, or any place where it is desired to feed grain to 
them. The stand is fourteen inches 



J& m &h ma< ^ e of inch pine, with a cross- 
piece of hard wood and legs of the same inserted in 



STABLE REQUISITES. 6l 

them through auger holes. It should be a foot wide, 
with the sides three inches high. Animals can eat 
from both sides and nothing is wasted. 

Of the miscellaneous stable tools I need say little, 
except to urge that each shall have a place and be kept 
there. A wooden broom back of the cow stalls is a 
good adjunct of the dung fork, and a common broom 
in the entry and aisles should be used daily. 

Here is a handy wheelbarrow 
for the cow stables for moving bun- 7^!^ 
dies of straw and corn fodder. The ^SS^r 
construction of the front allows of ^^ 
good sized loads not possible in a common wheelbarrow. 

The dairyman should know the capacity of his 
various measures, baskets and buckets in pounds, as 
well as in volume, since food rations are necessarily 
quoted in pounds. Milk pails can be made of a uni- 
form weight; say two pounds exactly. It is then a 
simple and easy matter to accurately weigh the pro- 
duct of each cow as it is drawn, and at once record 
the weight. 

The thermometer is a necessary thing in a stable, 
as without it there is danger of ill ventilation. The 
habit of looking at the temperature of the stable is a 
good one. Light and good ventilation are especially 
necessary in winter. 

A well-built dry goods box can 
easily be made into a very convenient 
: feed chest by cutting it down in the 
manner shown. Let the lid project a 
little and cut out a place for the fingers in the front ot 
the box. If the box is long enough, a partition can 




62 BIGGLE COW BOOK. 

be put in the middle for two kinds of grain. 

It is a great convenience to have platform scales 
at the barn. Calves are to be weighed, rations made 
up, and things bought and sold. It tends toward 
accuracy. 

It is important to save every pound of the urine. 
A feasible plan is to place horse manure daily in the 
gutter in rear of cows, and to sprinkle land plaster or 
kainit on this, or have the urine run from the gutter to 
a sunken hogshead; it should be saved by all means as 
it is the key to successful farming. 

A little medicine chest or closet is almost a neces- 
sity, though its contents need not be very varied. It is 
well to have Epsom salts and a few other simple things 
within reach; also some bottles suitable for adminis- 
tering doses when occasion arises. The best dairying 
involves but little doctoring. 

FIXINGS. 

Make everything in the stable as plain and smooth as possible, 
avoiding corners and protruding timbers. 

Don't try to economize overhead space — the more the room 
the better the air. 

Two or three milk-fed cats at the barn 
are the best rat exterminators. 

Keep things clean and bright. 

Give personal attention to things. 

A penny saved is a penny earned. 

Cold draughts are the seeds of dis- 
ease and loss. 

A spring, or weight and pulley, on the cow stable door, is a 
good investment, as it insures against accidentally leaving it open. 

The manure gutter should be hard enough and smooth enough 
to bear scrubbing with a splint broom. The feed trough should 
be of a shape to make washing easy; preferably low, flat and 
passing in front of all the cows. Walls and ceiling should be 
whitewashed. 





Chapter XII. 
THE CxOOD MILKER. 

Of all scrub stock the scrub milker is the worst. — Dorothy Tucker. 

It is an accomplishment to be a 
rapid, thorough milker. It comes 
from early training, long practice and 
close intimacy with cows. Not only 
is precious time saved by a quick 
performance of the operation, but the cow's full capa- 
city of production is encouraged. The precious liquid 
is drawn to the last drop, and the last drop is the 
richest of all. 

The knack of milking is hard to describe; it comes 
by practice. The full teat is compressed by the hand 
in such a manner that the flow is downward, not back 
into the udder. A good milker will cause a perfect 
white shower to descend to the pail. In five minutes the 
udder is empty and the pail filled with froth-covered 
milk. 

Good milking involves absolute cleanliness ; a 

great many rapid milkers are unclean in their practices. 

It is no uncommon thing, for instance, to milk wet; 

that is, the milker intentionally moistens his hands with 

milk, and then proceeds to fill the pail. 

The practice does not really make milking easier, 
and it is too much like using the pail as a wash basin. 
It is altogether inexcusable. 




64 BIGGLE COW BOOK. 

To grasp the teats of a cow just after she has arisen 
from the bed in her stall, and to milk dry, is the other 
extreme. Dust, dirt and manure particles tumble freely 
into the pail. 

The teats and udder should not be washed off, but 
wiped off with a dry cloth before 
milking. If water is used the 
teats will likely crack. A rough, 
loose cloth is best. Gunny-sack 
r^is splendid for this purpose, 
i Then milk with hands dry. 

It is strictly true that many 

a favorite. so-called good dairies send oat 

unclean milk; milk made unclean by the milkers. It 

is not only unclean, but is seeded with bacteria, which 

are the germs of decomposition. 

I fear that a great many good milkers are guilty of 
carelessness. The proof is in the bottom of the milk- 
man's serving can and in the bowl of the separator. 
The consumer too often finds black specks and worse 
in the bottom of the pitcher. 

The good milker does not allow the full pail to 
remain in the stable, but carries it at once into another 
and cleaner atmosphere. He is not content with a 
coarse wire strainer, but uses a double thick- 
ness of good cheese cloth, which catches all the 
hairs and dust particles and other impurities 
, which reach the pail under even the most 
careful management. 

The newly drawn milk is at once 
cooled to say 50 F., either by placing the can in ice 
water and stirring with a paddle or by means of a 





THE GOOD MILKER. 65 

cooler. This favors the escape of the so-called 
"steam," and also of the "cow odor," and the milk 
is then ready for the delivery cans or bottles. 

The cooling of the milk should be done only 
in a pure atmosphere ; not in the stable nor in a room 
opening into the stable. 

There are various milk coolers on the market, and 
the choice of one should involve two 
considerations : efficiency and ease of 
cleaning after use. The method of run- 
ning the milk over cold plates is pref- 
erable to that of running it through 
pipes, as the former device is more cer- 
tain to be clean and free from taint. 

The speedy remove* 1 A the animal 

. - , mi 11 MILK COOLER, 

heat from cows milk *s perhaps the new way. 
most important requisite for good keeping quality. 

It is bad policy to milk a cow while she is eating. 
After a while she will not be disposed to stand to be 
milked unless she has something to eat. 

A great many kicking cows might be cured and 
more prevented, by simply trimming the finger nails 
often enough to keep them from cutting the teats. 

Be quiet while milking. Pet the cows. Talk 
when you get through. They will soon learn to 
expect a caress and it pays. 

The udder must be emptied to the last drop, and if 
this is not done every time the supply will fall short 
every time — that is, nature, finding that more milk has 
been produced than is required, will abstain from pro- 
ducing so much milk, and devote the food to the 
production of fat or of muscle. 



66 BIGGLE COW BOOK. 

The tidy milker should wear an apron like this. 
It can be made from a salt bag washed out fB s *T - T\ 
and hemmed. It should have strong cords |f \ ' * 
attached to it to tie around the body, and f » 

should be cut open in front for a little dis- 1 |___ 

tance from the bottom to make it easier to hold the 
milk pail. 

There are two things gained by warming the milk 
pail in winter ; first, the milk froths and foams and 
does not spatter and splash upon the person milk- 
ing, and second, the milk that is milked into a cold 
pail will not show the cream as thick or rich as when 
warm and foamy, and further, the quart or two of hot 
water carried to the barn to keep the pail warm can be 
put into a pail of water given the cow to drink, which 
is good for her. 

A simple device, easily applied, to keep a cow 
from switching her tail, is a heavy rope or light trace 
chain, made in a loop, to throw over the rump. This 
will prevent a good deal of switching by both man and 
beast. 

CO BOSS! 

When you are angry don't kick the cow. Kick the milking 
stool till you break yourself of the kicking habit. 

The milking stool is not a good hammer. 

To be overharsh with a cow is like wasting a quart of milk. 

Cows that leak their milk should be milked three times a day. 

There is no self-milking device which is a success. 

A slow milker will dry up a cow. 

Some cows are born kickers, some become kickers, and many 
more have kicking abused into them. 

Don't cool off the stables before milking. It makes the cows 
hold up their milk, and frequently they become fretful and kick. 



Chapter XIII. 
MILK AND CREAM. 




Milk is not a miraculous dispensation. — John Tucker. 

In ioo pounds of good milk there 
are about 87 pounds of water, 4 pounds 
of fat, 5 pounds of milk sugar, 3.3 
pounds of casein and albumen, and .7 pound of mineral 
matter or salt, the latter consisting mainly of phosphates 
and chlorides. The proportions vary. The total solids 
(everything except the water) may be as high as 18 per 
cent, or as low as 10 per cent. The fat varies from 

Milk Cream Colostrum 




2 per cent, to 7 per cent. , Ski " imi „ lk 

I 3, *"<> %° "Sol 



with 4 per cent, as an aver- 
age. The cheese maker l^,^ 
can get along with 3 per<f **}'•* 
cent., but prefers 3.5 perf o J°£vj.°; 
cent. v ; *V\* 

Milk laws in certain fat globules. 

states and cities demand not less than 3 to 3.5 per cent, 
of fat and 9 to 9.5 per cent, of solids not fat. This 
means total solids of 12 or 13 per cent. 

It is a great mistake to regard fat as the only valu- 
able part of milk, though fat is a good index, because 
the more fat the larger the percentage of total solids. 

A quart of milk weighs about 2.15 pounds, and a 
quart of cream about 2.10 pounds. 

I am sorry to introduce so many figures and per- 
centages, for they are not pleasant reading, but there 



68 BIGGLE COW BOOK. 

is no help for it. The profits of dairying depend on 
details, and the details are legion. 

The amount of fat in the milk of the same cow va- 
ries from time to time, from causes not always fully 
understood. The percentage differs greatly when some 
breeds are compared with others. The fat globules are 
actually larger in some breeds than others. Hence the 
cream rises more quickly and completely with the so- 
called butter cows. 

Many dairymen who retail their milk to private con- 
sumers find it advantageous to have both large milkers 
and rich milkers in the herd, in order to get quantity, 
quality and color. 

There are certain changes in the milk natural to the 
progress of the period of lactation. As the cow gets along 
there is an increased percentage of total solids. There 
is a greater viscosity or stickiness in the body (serum) 
of the milk, and the cream rises more slowly. 

Cream always rises most completely and most 
promptly if set soon after coming from the cow. 
Long journeys and continued agitation are hostile 

fr to cream gathering. 
S^t^o Bad flavors in milk and cream are due to one 

or more of several causes. They may arise from dirt, 
from the volatile oils of improper foods, from hostile 
bacteria, or from ill health of the cow. 

The first and last causes are inexcusable and avoid- 
able. The second cause (overfeeding of cabbage, tur- 
nips, mangels, ensilage, garlic) is under control of the 
dairyman, and may be remedied by a change of time 
of feeding or reduction of amount of food. 

The third cause (bacteria) is closely associated 



MILK AND CREAM. 69 

with the first. Hostile ferments caused by bacteria may 
be the result of dirt entering the milk or may come from 
storage in an unclean atmosphere. 

It is the sugar in milk which undergoes the quickest 
and greatest change when souring occurs. Sweet but- 
ter, as everybody knows, may be churned from sour 
cream. There is milk sugar in cream as well as in milk. 

The subject of bacteria is an important one to the 
dairyman. There are many ferments caused by bacteria 
which are not yet fully understood, but enough is known 
to emphasize the need of cleanliness in dairy work. 
Some bacteria are distinctly favorable, just as others 
are unfavorable to good results. The friendly bacteria 
are now employed in our butter making in much the 
same way that we employ yeast in our bread making. 
Each starts a desired ferment. 

The so-called preservatives of milk, widely adver- 
tised, are better let alone. They are germicides or 
antiseptics or bacteria killers. They contain salicylic 
acid, saltpetre, boric acid, borax or formaldehyde. 
They are not direct poisons, but seem to have a 
hurtful effect on the human system, often pro- 
ducing diarrhoea. In one sense they are adulterants. 
The United States Dispensatory says the use of 
salicylic acid should be prohibited. Preservatives 
are properly forbidden by law in some states and 

cities - tom™. 

Milk is not commonly adulterated, except with 

preservatives or with w r ater. 

If milk be properly aerated and cooled to 45 or 50 

when drawn there should be no trouble in keeping it 

(at 50 ) for 24 or 36 hours; but it should never be suf- 



70 BIGGLE COW BOOK. 

fered to stand around in pitchers or open dishes in 
warm places. Neither should it be placed in closets or 
refrigerators with strong-flavored foods. It should be 
kept in a separate ice box. Old tin vessels are likely 
to impart a bad taste to milk. Wooden vessels are 
unsuitable, as they cannot be cleaned properly. Bright 
tin is good, while porcelain and glass are even better. 

When it is necessary to keep milk a long time there 
are several ways of doing it. Pasteurization is one 
method ; or the process may be carried up to the point 
of sterilization. Condensed milk is another form in 
which long-keeping quality is secured. These are all 
natural methods ; which cannot be said of the results 
secured by preservatives. 

Pasteurization is recommended for milk for babies, 

or when cold storage is not feasible. The requisite 

apparatus is simple, consisting essentially of a covered 

I ^ JL^ boiler. Bottles of milk are placed in the 

'5|~|^C_3boiler (not on the bottom, but on sup- 

iPjY K Aft ports or a false bottom ) , with cold water 

■ffifftl around them to a height above the 

^JL^ w tH%&&t height of the milk in the bottles. Stop- 

PASTEURIZING ° , \ 

apparatus, pers of absorbent cotton are to be used; 
but not ordinary corks, as they are not to be trusted 
for cleanliness. The required temperature is 157 to 
160 F. The heat is to be maintained for half an hour, 
when the bottles are to be cooled as quickly as possible 
and kept in a cool place, and left closed until used. 

Sterilized milk is made at a higher temperature, 
almost or quite the boiling point. The albumen is 
likely to coagulate aiid form a scum. 

The words "pasteurize" and "sterilize" are not 






MILK AND CREAM. 71 

yet used in a strictly accurate sense. In popular lan- 
guage any method of destroying bacteria by a high 
temperature is ''sterilizing," whereas to produce actual 
and complete sterilization necessitates the repeated 
heating of the milk to the boiling point for three succes- 
sive days. This is to kill not only the bacteria, but the 
spores of the bacteria ; the latter not being destroyed 
by a single boiling. Sterilization can be accomplished 
in a shorter time by heating to 248 , but this is possible 
only under pressure, as water boils at 212 . Pasteuri- 
zation is usually sufficient, so far as health is concerned, 
if the milk is to be used soon. In both processes the 
sealing and quick cooling are essential parts of the 
operation. 

There is no known simple test to determine the 
presence of disease germs in milk, and hence the ne- 
cessity for the processes just described. 

Condensed milk is made by sterilizing ordinary 
milk under pressure and evaporating say one-half its 
water, when it is put in tin or glass and hermetically 
sealed. It will thus keep indefinitely. There are two 
processes, one involving the addition of common sugar 
and one without sugar. The manufacture of condensed 
milk has become an American industry. It has long 
been carried on in Switzerland. 

Milk when about to sour will coagulate when 
boiled. Farrington, of Wisconsin, has devised an alka- 
line tablet for determining the amount of acid, without 
boiling. The tablet solution with fresh milk produces 
a pink color. With milk about to sour this pink color 
is but faintly shown or is absent. This inexpensive test 
is suited to household use. 



7? BIGGLE COW BOOK. 

Ropy milk is probably the result of the presence of 
hostile bacteria, presumably in the pasture. It is ex- 
tremely annoying to dairymen. A change of pasture 
is the only remedy that I can recommend with 
confidence. 

DRIPPINGS. 

Freshness in milk is as much a matter of care as a matter of 
hours. 

Freshly drawn milk is sterile. The dairyman decides what 
species 01 bacteria shall enter it. 

Cool the milk quickly. It is the secret of good keeping qualities. 

The cream from some cows is so slow in rising that it does not 
rise until after skimming and not then. 

Night's milk is richer than morning's. 

It is said that milk does not quench thirst like water. It is 
more victuals than drink. 

Cream is 15 per cent, lighter than the milk. This is why it 
rises to the surface. 

Condensed milk, in proportion to uncondensed, is one to four. 
The water is driven out and the solids retained. By adding water 
it is milk again, though not exactly as it comes from the cow. 

Boiling milk does not make it more easily digested. Boiling or 
scalding well kills the germs which may cause purging. 

Leaving the milk in the stable till it gets cold makes j£JU$. 
less cream. 

The milk of cows in calf will get thick and ropy 
sooner if fed all dry and heating foods. 

I do not know anything which will take 
garlic out of milk better than pigs in the 
pasture. 

Who hath woe? Who hath redness of 
eyes ? Verily, it is she that crieth over spilt 
milk. — Source unknown. 

The use of scalded or pasteurized milk 
for infants is frequently dangerous. It should be employed by close 
observers only, and its use discontinued if constipation results. 




Chapter XIV. 



BUTTER. 




Not merely gilt-edge, but solid gold all through; the only 
genuine gold bricks in the world. — Tim. 

Cream is an article which varies con- 
siderably in its composition. Snyder's 
"Chemistry of Dairying" quotes the follow- 
ing average analysis of twenty-five samples: 

Per cent. 

Water 66.41 

Fat 25.72 

Casein and albumen 3.70 

Milk sugar 3.54 

Ash 63 

I It will be seen that the total solids 

- yy f^k amount to 33.59 per cent.; that is, 

"v£%s^ cream j s about two-thirds water and 

one-third solids. According to Snyder the fat in cream 

varies all the way from 10 to 60 per cent., with an 

average of 20 or 25 per cent. 

The total solids of milk, it will be 
remembered, amount to about 12 or 13 
per cent. Cream has the same ingredients ABR 
as milk, but in different proportions; that MTTtU? 
is, none of the milk ingredients are 
wholly absent from cream. 

Butter is usually regarded as consist- 
ing of fat and fat only, but the chemist churning when 

C A • '<- 11 *U -11 A • HARRIET WAS 

finds in it all the milk and cream ingre- a girl. 

dients, possibly excepting albumen. The following 




74 BIGGLE COW BOOK. 

figures represent the average of twenty analyses of 
butter made by the Minnesota Experiment Station: 

Per cent. 

Water 12.00 

Fat 85.00 

Ash and salt 2.25 

Casein and milk sugar 75 

Butter should not contain less than 83 per cent, of 
fat, though the amount varies; nor more than 15 per 
cent, of water. 

An examination of the analysis of butter will show 
at a glance why it is customary to add, say, one-sixth 
of the known weight of butter fat in a given quantity 
of milk in estimating in advance the product of butter. 

One-sixth is 16.6 per cent. To allow for inevitable 
losses it is considered safer in making estimates of 
butter to add only 15 per cent, of the actual weight of 
fat in the milk. 

The main object in cream gathering is the manu- 
facture of butter, although large quanti- 
^ ties of cream are now sold for domestic 
HW%^§k $r use - ^he * ce cream makers also use 
if* Trjjf J& considerable amounts. When a good 
hh s ^S$i^0 s ^ cream trade can be secured, the best 
cash results are to be had in that way, as cream is more 
of an article of luxury than butter. 

There are two systems of cream gathering prac- 
tised in America, one depending on gravity and the 
other on centrifugal force. 

The gravity plan offers a choice between shallow 
and deep setting. In shallow setting use is made of 
tin pans or glazed earthen crocks. The depth of milk 
Is two to six inches. A great surface is exposed to the 




BUTTER. 75 

air, and there is constant danger of contamination from 
dust particles. This plan is often practised in private 
families, the milk being set in closets, pantry shelves, 
cellars or spring houses. It usually sours quickly. 
The plan is not the best, though good products are 
obtainable under strict cleanliness. 

The deep-setting method, which is next in effi- 
ciency to the separator, makes use of round cans made 
of heavy tin, about 8 inches in diameter and 18 to 26 
inches in depth. These cans set in ice water produce 
very satisfactory results in from 12 to 24 hours. The 
cream may be removed from the surface, 
or the skimmilk may be drawn off from 
beneath by a small spigot at the bottom of 
the can. The loss of fat may be reduced 
by the deep setting system ( according to,- 
Plumb) to .17 of one per cent., as against 

, , - r CREAM SET- 

a loss of .34 of one per cent, in surface ting can. 
skimming. Cheap tin vessels should never be used, 
as the milk and cream are tainted as soon as the tin 
has worn off the iron. 

In 100 pounds of 4 per cent, milk the lost fat in 
shallow setting would amount to .34 of a pound, or 8}£ 
per cent, of the total fat, while the lost fat in deep set- 
ting would amount to only. 17 of a pound, or 4X per cent, 
of the total fat. The deep system is therefore better. 
Deep setting in spring water is 
good, but a cabinet creamer is better, 
Hon account of the use of ice. These 
I devices are, however, being largely 
||replaced by mechanical separators. 
cabinet creamer. ' ' Sweet cream butter ' ' is not in 





76 BIGGLE COW BOOK. 

general demand in America. It has been put upon 
the market from time to time, and is now manufactured 
in certain localities, but is usually bought only for 
special purposes. The sweet product made by the 
Swedish butter extractor, in 1889 and later, found but 
few patrons, and the extractor itself appears to have 
practically disappeared from the American market. As 
reported upon by the Delaware station it obtained only 
84.60 pounds of butter out of a possible 100, as against 
93.94 pounds obtained by a cream separator and churn. 
Sour cream butter is in general favor in the United 
States. The sourness is caused by lactic acid, and the 
lactic acid is caused by or accompanied by well-known 
bacteria of several species. 

Cream, whether obtained by gravity or by sepa- 
rator, must be ''ripened" in order to secure the desired 
butter flavor. Long experience and best methods have 
established a standard of excellence in butter; and the 
butter maker must needs cater to this popular taste. 
J\ Among recent important discoveries in the 

science of dairying is the fact that the ferments 
of milk and cream are under human control; that 
bacteria cultures may be prepared on a commer- 
cial scale for use in butter making just as yeast is 
used in bread making; and that these ferment 
starters tend to make an exact science of what 
formerly was guesswork. 

The widely-advertised bacteria cultures for 
producing a certain much-desired butter flavor are 
nothing more nor less than preparations which 
thermom- start tne f erm ents which come naturally in 
eter. all good dairies under most favorable circum- 



BUTTER. 77 

stances. Butter made under the best conditions of 
breed, feed, care and treatment, without artificial aid, 
is the pattern which the bacteria culturist successfully 
imitates. The cultures merely start the souring in the 
right direction. 

The process of ripening cream is hastened by 
stirring and aerating. The time required is about 
twenty-four hours. No new or sweet cream should 
be added at churning time, or within twelve hours 
previously, as it will be mostly lost; or else the ripened 
cream will be overchurned 

The temperature for churning sour cream, well 
ripened, should be about 6o° F. in summer and 65 F. 
in winter. For churning sweet cream the proper 
temperature is 50 to 55 °. 

A small amount of butter color is allowable, with- 
out conflicting with the food laws against 
adulteration. Annatto (Bixa orellana) or J 
some other vegetable preparation should be^ 
used, but not aniline dye. The use of carrots! 
in the cow manger is to be recommended. 

Churning should be a quick, cleanly ioned churn. 
operation. The washing and working involve details 
of individual choice and experience. Salting is a 
matter of market. Three-quarters of an ounce of 
salt to the pound is a good average quantity. The 
salt should not show a tendency to absorb water or 
to become hard and lumpy. There are better brands 
on the market. 

Printing and packing demand precision of method. 

^^^It always pays to make a neat print for the 




l-JL 'retail market, and to put the lump in fresh 




78 BIGGLE COW BOOK. 

butter paper. A nickel's worth of care will add a 
dime to the market value. 

White-oak, spruce and white-ash vessels (tubs, 
kegs, firkins) are suitable for butter-packing purposes. 
% They must be perfectly clean, and should be 
f soaked in brine before being used. The butter 
is packed in a two-inch layer ; then sprinkled 
with salt ; then a two-inch layer of butter, etc. The 
top is covered with a white muslin cloth. 

Pasteurized butter is butter made from pasteurized 
cream. It is unwise to expect pronounced flavor with 
any special bacteria as a starter without first using heat 
to destroy the ferments already present in the cream, 
which may be of an undesirable kind. 

In closing I will briefly summarize the whole pro- 
cess of butter making for the benefit of the novice. 

First, put clean, sweet cream into a jar or can in a 
cool, well- ventilated place, where there are no suspi- 
cious odors. Bad odors will make bad butter. Stir the 
cream gently at least twice a day. The cellar or milk 
room temperature should be from 55 to 65 . At this 
temperature the cream will sour or ripen inside of forty- 
eight hours with a characteristic fragrance which cannot 
be mistaken when once learned. No fresh cream should 
be added to the jar within twelve hours of churning, as 
it will not ripen and will be mostly lost. Sweet cream 
can be churned, but its churning time and temperature 
are different from sour cream. Churning should be 
done frequently for best results — twice a week at least. 

On churning days scald the churn and then rinse it 
with cold water. Use a dairy thermometer in the cream, 
and make the temperature 65 in winter or 6o° in sum- 



BUTTER. 79 

mer. Add a little butter color, if desired, as per direc- 
tions on the bottle. Churn steadily — neither fast nor 
slow. The butter will come, under ordinary circum- 
stances, in half an hour. 

Churn slowly at the last until the butter becomes 
granulated the size of kernels of wheat. Draw the but- 
termilk and wash in two waters; cold, clear water. Salt 
in the churn and mix the salt in well. After salting let 
it stand thirty minutes for the salt to dissolve, closing 
the churn. Then work in the churn, either by churn- 
ing or with paddles, until it becomes one mass. Then 
it is ready to ball or put into tub or box. 

Never employ a man in the dairy who uses tobacco. 
The fumes of tobacco smoke are exceedingly penetrat- 
ing and lasting, and will surely affect the butter. 

No butter, however well made, will retain all its 
flavor and aroma more than ten days or two weeks. 

Working butter too much, or when too cold, 
breaks the grain and gives it a salvy^; 
appearance that lessens its market/ 2 
value. Such butter soon loses flavor 
and becomes rancid. 

' ' If you want your butter both nice and sweet 
Don't turn with nervous jerking, 
But ply the dasher slowly, and then 

You'll hardly know that you're working ; 
And when the butter has come, you'll say 
'Yes, surely, this is the better way — ' 

Churn Slowly." 

A damp or hot place will not do to store butter. 
The store-room must be dry, sweet and cool. Cover 
with damp salt and a cloth. 




8o 



BIGGLE COW BOOK. 



GRANULES. 

Cheap parchment paper sometimes moulds and causes mouldy 
butter. 

We should be sending more butter abroad. 

It is better to keep ten 300-pound cows than twenty 150-pound 
cows. Six times the profit in the former. 

Butter making is an art suited to women. 

Bad butter is oleo's best friend. 

It costs as much to make butter that will sell for soap grease, 
as a first-class article that will sell at a fancy price. 

Conceit will not make good butter. 

Butter loses by storage. 

Don't hurry the cows to or from the pasture. If you do you 
will have to hurry the butter to market or lose your trade. 

Better churn twice than mix cream in different stages of 
ripening. 

Look forward to a winter dairy. 

There is a big difference between the cash and trading out the 
butter. 

The average farm-house cellar is an unnatural butter kingdom. 

A good butter maker is a sun worshipper and a hot water crank. 




Chapter XV. 
IMITATIONS. 

There is fraud somewhere when an article must be misnamed 
in order to sell it. — John Tucker. 

The adulteration of foods is widely practised, and 
dairy products form no exception to the general rule. 
Fortunately the law is taking note of such frauds, and 
food commissioners are at work to protect the public 
against deception. 

Bogus butter is mainly of two kinds, known re- 
spectively as oleomargarine and butterine. 

These products are made of beef fat, and are in 
one sense by-products of beef slaughtering operations 
in the great cities. Fats of various grades of cleanness 
and uncleanness are put through filter presses, and the 
fats thus graded. The harder fats are used for the 
manufacture of soap and candles. 

The softer fats are put into churns with sweet milk, 
and then churned, colored, salted, and packed to re- 
semble butter in both taste and appearance. The pro- 
ducts are sold as oleomargarine and butterine. 

There is a slight difference between the melting 
points of these two articles. Butterine is sold in the 
northern markets, frequently in illegal competition 
with genuine butter. Oleomargarine is sent South 
and is also largely exported. 

Cheese is adulterated by a substitution of lard and 
cottolene oil for the real butter fat of milk, the milk 



82 BIGGLE COW BOOK. 

having been previously robbed of its butter fat. Such 
cheeses are said to be filled. In some places the law 
provides that cheese shall contain at least three per 
cent, of butter fat. 

Butyrin to the extent of about seven per cent, is 
present in genuine butter and nearly absent in the imi- 
tations of butter. The law is fully justified in demand- 
ing that all food products shall be sold strictly true to 
their own names and not disguised so as to imitate 
higher-priced products. Fraud is fraud, and should 
be so regarded. 

The so-called butter increasers occasionally offered 
for sale, claiming to double the butter product of a 
given amount of cream, contain acetic acid (or some 
other acid) which curdles the casein and causes it to 
mix with the butter fat. The product is neither butter 
nor cheese, but a mixture. There is an increase in the 
weight of butter, but the process is not honest. Be- 
ware of any butter increasers except good cow food. 



In round figures it requires ten pounds of milk to make a 
pound of cheese and twenty pounds of milk to make a pound ot 
butter. 

Cow's milk is not fit for cheese until the calf is a week old. 

Can you not invent a nice little cheese for a nice little retail 
trade of your own ? 

It is cheese, not butter, that carries fertility from the farm; 
$12.30 to the ton of whole-milk cheese. 

A ton of skimmilk cheese is credited with fertilizing value to 
the amount of $23.55. 

A slow coming and curing cheese is best. 

Cured whole-milk cheese contains about one-third fat and a 
little less than one-third casein and albumen and one-third water. 

Every shade of cowy or animal odor and taint can be elimi 
nated from cheese by airing the warm curd, provided sweet remiet 
is used and the curd is gotten out of the whey and the airing is, 
done before acidity sets in 




Chapter XVI. 
CHEESE. 

Cheese is the most convenient permanent form in which milk 
can be preserved for consumption. — Henry Stewart. 

Cheese is milk minus the whey, 
plus the curing. An ingredient of 
the milk has been dropped and cer- 
tain chemical and mechanical changes effected. 

New milk contains some free soda, and is slightly 
alkaline. When it becomes acid by fermentation, or 
when an acid is added, the casein and most of the 
solids are coagulated. They no longer remain in real 
or apparent solution, but separate from the whey. 

Rennet is the agent commercially employed to 
produce quick coagulation. The result is called curd 
or curds. 

Various acids have been used for forming curd — 
acetic, hydrochloric, lactic, etc. The acid reaction of 
rennet is, however, the most satisfactory of all. 

Rennet is a name applied with propriety not only 
to the mucous membrane of the fourth stomach of a 
young calf but to the liquid infusion made from this 
membrane. Rennet occurs in the same way in other 
young ruminating animals, but the commercial supply 
comes from calves which have never been fed anything 
except milk. 

The stomach is salted inside and out, dried in a 
warm place, and kept until needed; or it may be kept 
packed in salt or in brine, 



84 BIGGLE COW BOOK. 

To prepare an infusion the stomach, or a portion 
of it, is steeped in warm water or whey, and bottled. 

To have good rennet, of known strength, is of 
prime importance in cheese making. 

The working and manipulation of the curd de- 
mands experience. Flavor is determined largely at 
this stage of the process. Some cheese makers em- 
ploy spices and aromatic herbs and even liquors, in the 
production of certain brands of cheese. 

An accurate thermometer should be employed in 
cheese-making operations. Though there are many 
ways of making good cheese, each way demands accu- 
racy of detail. 

Cheese is made of whole milk, of whole milk with 
cream added, of partly skimmed milk, of skimmed 
milk, of cream ; and even buttermilk is employed in 
making some so-called cheeses. 

Filled cheese, sometimes called oleo cheese or lard 
cheese, is made by combining oleo oil with skimmed 
milk. 

Full cream cheese, honestly made, is of course the 
best; though some of the fancy cheeses, made with 
special care, command higher prices. . 

Skill in manipulating the curd in its early stages 
must be supplemented by equal skill in the curing of 
the cheese. The ripening process is of great im- 
portance. 

The factory process of cheese making in America 
may be briefly outlined as follows: The milk is received 
twice a day. The evening milk is kept over night at 
6o°, and then thoroughly mixed with morning's milk 
and heated to 8o°. Rennet is added in sufficient quan- 



CHEESE. 85 

tity to bring the curd in an hour. When the curd has 
become sufficiently solid to split before the finger it is 
cut with implements called curd knives into small cubes. 
The vat is then heated gradually to 95 ° or 96 , and the 
heat is maintained for an hour or more. Difference in 
time makes a difference in the ultimate hardness or 
firmness of the cheese. 

At the conclusion of the heating or cooking the 
curd is well-stirred, to facilitate the separation of the 
whey. After a slight acidity has developed the whey 
is drawn off, and the curd allowed to cool. 

It is next torn to fragments, and when sufficiently 
firm is ground into small pieces and salted at the rate 
of two pounds per 100 of curd or 1000 pounds of milk 
used. The curd is then ready for pressing and curing. 

The curing-room, a necessary feature of a cheese- 
making establishment, is an apartment provided with 
capacious shelving. The temperature not above 60 ° or 
65 ° and moisture should be uniform and the ventilation 
good. The cheeses, properly bandaged, require fre- 
quent turning and considerable time for their proper 
ripening. The American standard cheese weighs sixty 
pounds. 

For producing small cheeses at home, away from 
a factory, make curd by the use of rennet, as already 
described. A new wash-tub or other large receptacle 
may be employed as a vat. A cheese hoop may be 
made from a cheese-box from the grocery store. A 
head or follower can be sawed out to fit the hoop, and 
a lever press made with a flat fence-rail. Or a number 
of small moulds can be made of tin fruit cans, with 
tops and bottoms unsoldered. 



86 BIGGLE COW BOOK. 

Mix well-stirred night's milk with morning's milk, 
as already described, and heat to 88°. Use a teaspoon- 
ful of coloring to 150 pounds of milk, and enough 
rennet to curdle in fifteen minutes. 

After cutting the curd raise to a temperature of 
102 °. This can be done by dipping off the whey, heat- 
ing it, and returning it to the curd, all the while stirring 
gently. 

When the curd particles seem elastic, and fall apart 
when gently pressed with the hand, the whey may be 
removed, except enough to cover the curd. 

The curd is placed in the moulds, and light pressure 
applied. In half an hour the cheeses should be ready 
for bandaging with muslin — a strip around the circum- 
ference and a piece for top and another for bottom. 
The cloths should be dipped into hot water (120 ) 
before application. 

The cheeses thus wrapped, and further protected 
by pieces of muslin, are returned to the moulds, tops 
downward, and gradually subjected to heavy pressure, 
which should continue for a day. 

To ripen the cheeses they should be kept in an 
airy cellar, and turned daily for five or six days, each 
time rubbing them with salt. The temperature of the 
cellar should be 65 ° to 70 . After the salting has 
ceased the cheeses should be turned and rubbed 
with the hand daily, and then two or three times 
a week. In two or three weeks they will be ready 
for use. If they become mouldy they should be 
washed in strong brine. 

Stilton Cheese. The most famous of the double 
cream cheeses, the Stilton, is produced almost exclu- 



CHEESE. 87 

sively in Leicestershire, England, where the milk from 
cows grazing on sweet, rich pasture without artificial 
food is considered best. It is made from the morning's 
milk to which cream from the previous night's mess 
has been added in the proportion of one part cream to 
ten or twelve of milk. The curd is shaped in the 
hoop without pressure. To develop the blue mold 
that is an essential feature of this brand the curing is 
done in a warm room and sometimes bits of old cheese 
are put in the new. 

Pot Cheese. For the most delicious pot cheese 
the following recipe from a successful New York maker 
can be depended upon: To ten quarts of buttermilk 
add three quarts of skimmilk. Heat it slowly, and 
when the curd has risen dip it off carefully and put it 
in a thin cloth to drain. Add butter to suit the degree 
of richness required, and salt to the taste, mixing all 
thoroughly. 

Edam. This cheese gets its name from a town in 
Holland. It is the nearly globular, reddish-colored 
cheese now widely sold in all leading American grocery 
stores. 

Sage. Sage cheese may be made in a small dairy. 
This is one of the so-called green cheeses. Green 
sage, parsley and marigold leaves are used in the pro- 
cess of manufacture. 

Neufchatel. An American brand of this French 
cheese is to be had in our large cities. The cheese is 
a pasty substance, to be spread on bread after the 
fashion of butter. 

Brie. This is a French cheese which is now made 
in America. It is of a soft, almost creamy, consistency. 



88 BIGGLE COW BOOK. 

Roquefort. This is another cheese depending 
for its flavor largely upon fungous growths. 

Cheddar. English Cheddar is regarded as the 
best plain cheese in the world, and American Cheddar 
is quite similar to it. The whole milk is warmed to 
8o°, and the curd broken into fine pieces. Curd and 
whey are brought to ioo°, and the whey drawn off 
when a certain degree of acidity has been reached. It 
is salted at the rate of two pounds to ioo pounds of curd. 

Pineapple. This is one of the small, high-priced 
cheeses in favor in America. It pays to make such 
goods. 

The discovery that cheese is cured more satisfac- 
torily in cold storage than in the old-style curing rooms 
promises to work a great reformation and economy in 
handling this product. The low temperatures, 36 to 
50 , appear best ; they also permit the least drying and 
loss of weight, saving, it is estimated, about two-thirds 
of this loss. Numerous experiments prove that cheese 
so ripened is of superior texture and flavor, and brings 2 
cents or more per pound over the same cheese ripened 
in the old way. It also saves labor in turning and tub- 
bing, which was quite an expense. Low-temperature 
ripening requires more time than the old method. The 
Department of Agriculture, Washington, D. C, issues 
free bulletins, giving full information on this subject. 




Chapter XVII. 
BEEF. 

Some folks want a steer and a cow all in one animal — beef and 
butter. It is a partnership which does not work well. — John Tucker. 

The commercial profits of beef production depend 
largely on location and conditions. Beefing in a 
dairying district does not pay, nor 
does dairying in a beef district. 
Close to the large eastern cities the 
dairy cow is at her best, and feed- 
ing steers is at a discount. In the 
West, where not adjacent to good 
local dairying markets, the fattening of steers for ship- 
ment is a profitable industry. 

There are also intermediate districts where milk 
and beef are both in demand, and where heavy cows 
are able to supply both. 

Even in the East some dairymen make a habit of 
buying large-framed cows when fresh, feeding them 
heavily, milking them as long as profitable, and then 
selling them to the butcher, replacing them with other 
animals with calves by their sides. To supply this de- 
mand is the business of some drovers, 
who buy the fresh cows in districts 
remote from the large cities and ship u 
them in carload lots and sell them at ^ 
public auction. 

The heavy breeds of cattle are adapted to the 
needs of the cheese maker rather than the butter maker. 




90 BIGGLE COW BOOK. 

The smaller breeds are not in high favor with the 
butchers, who complain that the meat is yellow and 
less salable than where the fat is white in color. Fancy 
and prejudice go a long way, even in beefsteaks. It 
is therefore better, in buying cows to fatten, to select 
those of square build, rather than small, triangle-shaped 
animals. The butcher always looks at the hip bones 
and at the rump. The choice cuts and best prices per- 
tain to that end of the animal. 

The business of beef production involves a care- 
ful study of economic principles. Carefully conducted 
experiments show that steers like cows must be fed on 
a well balanced ration; that such a ration produces 
more gain and more profit than a poorly balanced 
ration; that such beef actually has a higher market 
value per pound than the beef from animals fed on a 
poorly constructed ration ; and that the ordinary corn 
and cob meal used by farmers is unprofitable, when 
used alone, as it requires the addition of some highly 
nitrogenous food like wheat bran or cottonseed meal 
to make it fully advantageous. 

Sometimes it is feasible, even in the East, to buy 
steers in the autumn for winter feeding 
on terms that admit of financial profit. 
Whenever this plan will fully pay the 
cash outlay, and leave a big manure 
pile as clear profit, it is to be com- 
mended. The manure of a steer well 
fed for six months should be worth from $10 to $15. 

In raising calves for steers the early feeding should 
be right. Castration should occur at the age of six 
months, and the animal should be fit for the butcher 




BEEF. 91 

when two years old. It is believed that profits 
lie mainly in early maturity wherever high feeding is 
practised. 

In making a fattening or beef-producing ration for 
a dairy cow we have no better ingredient than corn 
meal. It is practically the same with the steer. In all 
cases the ration must be balanced, or the excess of 
corn meal will simply go to the dung heap. 

Here are two suggested rations for steers weigh- 
ing 1000 pounds, the ration in each case to cover a 
whole day: 

10 lbs. shelled corn. 
5 lbs. wheat bran. 

4 lbs. linseed meal (new process). 
10 lbs. corn fodder (dry). 

3 lbs. wheat straw. 
40 lbs. corn ensilage. 

5 lbs. clover hay. 
10 lbs. finely ground corn meal. 

3 lbs. cottonseed meal. a "beefy" cow and calf. 

The latter is, I think, distinctly better in calling 
for finely ground corn meal instead of whole corn. 
The cottonseed meal should be divided so as not to 
all come in either of the three daily meals. It is a 
highly concentrated food. 

Corn silage is of great value in a ration for fat- 
tening steers, but a ration of silage and corn meal alone 
is not safe. A mixture of straw or chaff with the silage 
and meal renders it safe — one pound of straw to every 
three pounds of silage. 

The daily gain in weight grows less as cattle grow 
older. Steers matured and marketed at two years old 
give thirty per cent, more profit than if kept till three. 




9 2 



BIGGLE COW BOOK. 



A iooo-pound steer requires an average of eleven 
pounds of feed to make one pound of gain. 

A juicy, tender young beef should be one of the 
good things a grazing farm produces for family use 
every fall. November and December are good months 
for slaughtering, as the meat can be kept fresh nearly 
all winter. 

Neighborhood beef clubs are in favor in some places. 
These clubs are conducted on various plans. The 

idea is co-operative, and 

the details are arranged 

to suit the members. A 

score of families, more 

or less, join together and 

agree that a beef shall be 

killed and divided every 

week. This would mean 

twenty pounds of fresh 

good ones. meat to each family from 

a beef dressing 400 pounds. Each member in turn 

furnishes the animal. It is found best to have the 

slaughtering always done in the same place. 




DRIED BEEF. 

A cold animal may shiver off many pounds of flesh. Give the 
fattening steer a teaspoonful of salt daily. Beef the rogue cows. 

Veal the male calves or beef them. Don't monkey them. 

To grow animals, feed one thing ; to fatten them another. 

Don't get the steers to kicking. They can be coaxed better 
than whipped out of it. 

The most profit in the steer is in the first year's growth. The 
next year has less, and so on. 

Don't try to make the corn in the steer's belly take the place 
of shelter. 



Chapter XVIII. 
BY-PRODUCTS. 

" Gather up the fragments that nothing- be tost." 

Milk, cream, butter and cheese are the main pro- 
ducts of the dairy. The minor or by-products include 
skimmilk, cottage cheese or smearcase, whey and 
buttermilk. Calves are in one sense a by-product, but 
need no mention in this chapter. Manure is a by-pro- 
duct of great importance. 

For purposes of comparison it is well to have the 
(average) ingredients of milk and its by-products ar- 
ranged compactly expressed in percentages, as follows : 





Water. 


Fat. 


Casein and 
Albumen 
(Protein.) 


Sugar. 


Ash. 


Whole Milk . . 
Skimmilk . . . 
Buttermilk . . . 
Whey 


87.50 
90.25 
90.50 
93.00 


3-50 
.20 
.20 

•35 


3-25 

3.60 

3-3o 

.80 


5.00 
5-15 
5-30 
5.20 


•75 
.80 
.70 
•65 



[The percentage of fat varies greatly ; 3.50 percent, is too low 
for butter profits.] 

To emphasize the value of the by-products of milk 
as fertilizers the following will be found useful : 



Whole Milk 
Skimmilk 
Buttermilk . 
Whev . . . 



Nitrogen. 



Phosphoric 
Acid. 



•53 


.19 


.56 


.20 


.48 


•17 


•15 


.14 



Potash. 



•19 
.16 
.18 



This indicates that a ton of whole milk is worth as a 



94 BIGGLE COW BOOK. 

fertilizer about $2.04, a ton of skimmilk about $2.15, a 
ton of buttermilk about $1 . 84, and a ton of whey about 83 
cents. When these farm products are sold they carry 
away with them fertility to the amount stated. The 
milk of a cow for a year (5000 pounds or t.%. tons) 
would therefore carry away about $5.00 in the shape 
of fertilizers. If the cow's annual manure product is 
worth $19.00 this $5.00 must be deducted, leaving a net 
gain of only $14.00 for the manure. 

These figures show the wisdom of feeding the by- 
products of milk on the farm, unless they can be sold. 
Of course where they can be well marketed it is good 
business policy to do so, afterward investing part of 
the proceeds in artificial manures. 

I have been compelled to refer frequently to the 
term balanced ration, and whole milk may be used as 
an example. This article is an almost perfect food, es- 
pecially adapted to the body-growth of young animals. 

As milk is nearly all digestible the above analysis 
may be used as it stands. The rule says : Multiply 
the digestible fat by 1% and add to the digestible carbo- 
hydrates. This gives the sum total of the non-nitrog- 
enous elements, the fat being multiplied by 2% on 
account of its superior value as a heat producer. Then 
divide by the digestible protein and the result will indi- 
cate the nutritive ratio. That is, if the quotient be 4 
the ratio is said to be as 1 to 4, as in the case of whole 
milk. Hence we say that a ratio of 1 to 4 is the proper 
one for young, growing animals. 

It seems almost contradictory to say that, bulk for 
bulk, skimmilk is richer than new milk in protein (casein 
and albumen), but such is the case. Dairymen should 



BY-PRODUCTS. 95 

remember this in preparing the calf ration. It is not 
because anything has been added, but because the 
renewal of one element (the fat) increases the percent- 
age (not the quantity) of the remaining elements. 

Skimmilk is an excellent and nutritious food for 
man or beast, but whether used in the kitchen or in the 
dairy it should be supplemented by foods containing 
sugars and starches ( carbonaceous foods ) for reasons 
already explained. It is quite as important that 
human rations should be as well-balanced as stock 
rations. 

The sale of skimmilk should be encouraged by 
law, not discouraged. It is a wholesome food, and 
a perfectly honest article when sold under its true 
name. 

As a food for calves, pigs or even cows it is excel- 
lent. It may be fed sweet or sour ; preferably the 
former. Milk soured in a proper, cleanly manner is 
not unwholesome, but when permitted to sour in a 
filthy barrel it is liable to produce bowel troubles in 
young stock. Calves are sure to get the scours. Pigs 
appear to have stomachs made of cast-iron, but it is 
different with calves ; and I am sure it would be profit- 
able to practise cleanliness even with pigs. 

Cottage cheese or smearcase is an article of general 
home consumption and market sale in Pennsylvania 
and other states. It is simply sour milk with the whey 
drained off. The residue, which is mainly casein, is 
in reality a cheese. It is salted and made into balls 
for sale, or is sold by the dipperful. On the table it 
is often prepared by adding cream, salt, pepper, etc., 
to increase its palatability. It is a cheap, wholesome, 




9b BIGGLE COW BOOK 

nutritious food, especially if eaten with fruit, either 
raw or cooked. 

Whey consists mostly of water and sugar, as shown 
in the analysis. It is valuable for food, especially for 
pigs. To balance up a ration including whey the use 
of wheat bran would be advisable; not corn meal, as 
the latter would be too much like adding carbohydrates 
to carbohydrates. 

Buttermilk is somewhat 
like skimmilk in composi- 
tion, as will be seen by the 
analysis. It has some value 
as a beverage, and is sold for 
that purpose; but its usual 
we call this one destination is the swill-tub. 
"buttermilk." it is a useful food for the 

reasons that were mentioned in the case of skimmilk. 
Corn meal should be used with it rather than bran, as 
it is already rich in protein. 

Now that the buffalo has become nearly extinct we 
must look to cattle to supply us with carriage robes, and 
they will do it. I am now the possessor of a splendid 
robe made from a Galloway steer, and much prefer it to 
my buffalo robe. It is not so heavy, it is more flexible, 
and almost as warm. Preferably such robes are made 
from hides taken from animals in cold climates, that 
have wintered outdoors. Such robes can be bought 
at a moderate price, or a farmer can send a hide to the 
tanners and have it returned made into a robe. 

It is estimated that the loss to butchers, farmers 
and trappers in this country from wrong methods of 
removing and curing hides exceeds one million dollars 



RY-PRODUCTS. 



97 




annually. Figure i shows the right way of removing 
beef and calf hides and shows the shape of the hides 
when so removed. On the fore 
leg the cut should be made down 
to the armpit, then forward to the 
point of brisket as shown by 
dotted lines. On the hind leg 
the knife should also follow the 
dotted lines. Figure 2 shows 
how not to do it and the result 
fig. 1. of the wrong method. Never cut 

across the throat. Always take out the horns and 
tailbone and fill the cavity from which the bone is re- 
moved with salt or alum water. To salt a sixty 
pound hide requires a water-bucket of salt. Rub on 
well and roll up. By keeping back of knife close to 
hide and drawing firmly with the left, cutting or 
scoring will be prevented. 

Lastly I must say a word about 
manure, a by-product of the dairy 
of the greatest economic import- 
ance ; a thing too often treated 
carelessly, with consequent finan- 
cial loss. 

The manure from well-fed 
cows is estimated to be worth FIG - 2 - 

$2.00 per ton, and the yearly product, if it were 
possible to save all, nearly ten tons, or a total of not 
less than $19.00. Of all the foods given to the cow some 
eighty per cent, (in fertility) goes to the dung pile. 

The best known preservatives of manure in storage 
are such things as gypsum, kainit, etc. They absorb 




98 BIGGLE COW BOOK. 



man 



the ammonia that would otherwise be lost. A German 
authority recommends for daily use the following per 
880-pounds weight of cow : Superphosphate, 1 pound, 
2 ounces; gypsum, 1 pound, 12 ounces; kainit, 1 pound, 
5 ounces. The European people take good care of 
stable manure. 

I wish to call attention to the statements of chem- 
ists as to the relative value of solid and liquid cow 
manure. Take the item of nitrogen, for instance, 
which is by far the most expensive and valuable part 
of natural and artificial manures. A ton of fresh cattle 
excrement contains : Nitrogen, 5.8 pounds ; potash, 2 
pounds; phosphoric acid, 3.4 pounds. A ton of urine 
contains: Nitrogen, 11. 6 pounds; potash, 9.8 pounds. 
Computing nitrogen at 15 cents, potash at 5^ cents and 
phosphoric acid at 8 cents per pound, the respective 
values are $1.25 for the ton of excrement, and $2. 28 for 
the urine. 






CALLOWAY BULL AND COW. 




Chapter XIX. 
WINTER. 

December is as pleasa?it as May to the well-kept cow. — Tim. 

Winter dairying is no more difficult 
and is in many respects more satisfac- 
tory than summer dairying. It costs no 
more to feed the cows, and it is easier to properly care 
for the milk. In winter the flies are absent, and the 
ferments which make trouble are less active. It is less 
of a problem to keep things warm in winter than to 
keep things cool in summer. 

Of course it is cheaper to pasture cows than to feed 
them in the stall, but when all expenses are footed up, 
month by month, I find that there is not much difference 
among the twelve months of the year. Part of the sum- 
mer wages are chargeable to winter, on account of the 
gathering of harvests and filling of silos, so the outlay 
is not wholly a matter of season. 

A well-built cow stable is never cold. Hay, fodder, 
ensilage, feed, water should all be within convenient 
reach. 

Preparation for winter dairying should begin the 
previous spring, with the planting of ensilage corn. 
This corn should have the best of culture, and should 
be treated just as field corn is treated until September. 
It has by that time fully matured, with well-glazed 
grains. It is then harvested, taken at once to the barn, 
run through a cutter, and put into the silo. Four 
tons per cow per year is a safe allowance. A cubic 



IOO BIGGLE COW BOOK. 

foot of packed silage weighs 40 pounds as previously 
stated. 

Successional plantings of corn should be made for 
summer use in the dairy, to be fed on the soiling plan; 
that is, cut green and carried to the cows. 

Provision should be made in advance so that all 
the cows shall drop their calves in the autumn, from 
October to November. 

The food ration should have careful study, because 
with a stable of fresh cows it is desirable to work 
for best results in milk with least cost of material 
for food. 

I fear that many dairymen burn up too much food 
for fuel ; not literally, as some farmers burn corn, but 
in the stomachs of animals, for heating purposes. The 
barn is, perhaps, so cold that the animals must be 
converted into stoves. 

^p-^ The winter food of a cow must 

j I * \ be both good and inexpensive. One 

of the most famous dairies within my 
knowledge a few years ago used the 
following winter ration daily: Eight 
pounds cut clover hay, 8 pounds 
wheat bran, 8 pounds corn meal, 
"snowball." steamed and mixed. Of course a 
high-grade of milk was produced, and this dairy could 
afford the cost as its reputation was of the dollar-a-pound 
butter sort. This ration is too expensive for general use. 
Ensilage is the main reliance now for winter feed- 
ing, and even the smaller dairies can afford a silo. A 
round silo can be constructed quite cheaply. The 
United States Department of Agriculture describes a 




WINTER. _OI 

round silo of 180 tons capacity, 20 feet inside diameter 
and 30 feet deep, which can be constructed at an 
estimated cost of $246.59. This is a cost of only $1.37 
per ton of storage capacity. 

Here are a few protein analyses of silage for com- 
parison. They should set dairymen to thinking about 
the feeding possibilities of some other things beside 

COrn Silage: Average per 

cent, of protein. 

Corn silage .1.7 

Sorghum silage 0.8 

Red clover silage 4.2 

Soja bean silage 4.1 

Cowpea silage 2.7 

Field pea silage 5.9 

Corn and sorghum are both grasses in fact. They 
are low in protein (nitrogen) the most expensive ele- 
ment of mill feeds. Clovers, beans and peas are all 
legumes, and are all rich in protein, and will quite 
certainly be used some day for silage purposes. 

Taking corn silage (now in common use) as a 
basis for a good and cheap food for dairy cows, we 
begin with its analysis ; or rather, with its digestible 
analysis, as follows: 



Corn silage 



Protein. 



Carbohydrates 
and Fat. 



18.2 



Nutritive ratio. 



1 : 16.5 



This food as it stands has a proportion of sugars 
and starches far in excess of the protein, and out of 
proper proportion. Instead of 1: 16.5 we must try to 
get down to the Wisconsin ration (1:6.9) or preferably 
lower. The best and cheapest ingredients at hand 
are, say, clover hay and wheat bran. Hence I suggest 
the following, the cottonseed meal being introduced 



102 



BIGGLE COW BOOK. 



for balancing the ration; the ration to be divided so as 
to cover a day: 



40 pounds corn silage, 
8 " clover hay, 



5 pounds wheat bran, 

2 " cottonseed meal. 



This ration is a good one, and is not expensive. 
Its nutritive ratio is about 1:5.9. Farmers must figure 
out the ratio best suited to themselves and their crops. 
A little figuring will enable a dairyman to substitute 
dry corn fodder for the ensilage in this ration if desired. 
In the latter case I would recommend the use of some 
roots or pumpkins. 

SHIVERS. 

A stanchion-held cow lying down is sometimes tramped on by 
a neighbor. Injured teats may result. 

Winter dairying will never be overdone. Cold weather uses 
up the fat. 

Every shiver of the cow shakes money out of the owner's 
pocket. 

Do not, as soon as the first warm spring day comes, turn the 
cows out of their comfortable stable, and allow them to fill them- 
selves with frost-bitten grass. It will only fill them, not feed them; 
then, too, it is a very unhealthy filling. 

If winter feed is bought let it be in late summer; it is cheaper 



then. 



Stone basement barns are apt to be dark, damp and chilly. 



'fifty* 



NO SHIVERS HERE. 



T ^- 



Chapter XX. 
POINTS ON MARKETS. 

Sma/I profits and prompt settlements in cash. — John Tucker's Plan. 

Happy is the dairyman who can join hands with the 
consumer, and thus save the middleman's sometimes 
too generous profits. This is not always possible, of 
course, because a great deal of milk, butter and cheese 
must be sold wholesale. 

Speaking in general terms the cost of selling a 
perishable food product is just about equal to the cost 
of its production ; that is, if it costs two cents a quart to 
produce milk it will cost somewhere near two cents a 
quart to retail it. Milk costing two cents should sell for 
at least three cents wholesale, and six cents retail. This 
would allow a margin of profit to both producer and 
retailer. These figures are used merely for illustration. 

The margin of profit on butter is estimated on a 
different basis, because butter is far less perishable than 
milk, and the risk of carrying it in stock is less. It 
costs less to retail butter than milk because the holder 
of milk must sell it quickly, while the holder of butter 
is more independent and can wait a little for customers. 
The retail profits on butter usually are but a few cents 
a pound; perhaps just about as much per pound as the 
best producers make on each pound of their output. 

The only certainty of dairy profits lies in leading 
instead of following the market ; and every dairyman 




104 BIGGLE COW BOOK. 

is really his own judge, fixing to a certainty the market 
price of his own product. 

The old-fashioned forty-quart tin milk can is still 
in favor in Pennsylvania for shipping milk. In New 
England and elsewhere a much smaller can is used for 
shipping purposes. 

In the Philadelphia retail trade the 
time-honored cans and serving kettles of 
a past generation are still to be seen, but 
their days are numbered. 

The glass jar or bottle, with its close-fitting paste- 
board cover (the cover to be used but once), is so evi- 
dently superior in every way to the old-fashioned tin 
utensil that glass is fast taking possession of the market. 
Aside from cleanliness and fairness in distribution 
of cream, the glass jar is superior in accuracy of mea- 
surement. 

One of the agricultural papers lately published a 

letter from a farmer bearing directly on 

this point. A retail milkman gives away, 

|it is said, fifteen quarts to the hundred 

"for good measure." This seems to be 

common experience. The writer of the 

THREE SIZES OF , „ r ,11 

milk bottles, letter sells over two hundred quarts per 
day, at six cents per quart, and claims that the jars save 
$2 for one day, and for 365 days over $700 ; or in ten 
years $7000. 

Retail dairymen, especially if pro- 
ducers, do not usually measure closely. 
They commonly pour in a little extra bottle carrier. 
milk. It is this extra milk, according to the above, 
that would pay for a good farm in ten years' time. 





POINTS ON MARKETS. IO5 

The glass jar is a measure in itself. No extra milk 
goes with it. It protects both seller and buyer, and 
milk thus shipped commands a higher price. The 
bottles are of several sizes. The mouth is the same, 
in all cases, and is closed by the same circular bit of 
prepared pasteboard. 

As the jars are filled when fresh everybody gets 
the same proportion of cream, which is right ; and 
being full, there is no churning. 

It is easy to estimate the quantity and quality of 
the bacteria which reach milk shipped in this excellent 
manner. They are few and harmless. 

Who can compare the modern glass jar w r ith the 
old-fashioned, big-mounted milk kettle that must be 
opened and closed a score of times in the dirty streets 
of a town or city, while the contents splash and churn 
from the moment the first dipperful is removed ? Who 
can estimate the number of hostile bacteria which must 
of necessity get into milk so retailed, especially in 
summer weather ? 

The shipment of milk in glass jars will greatly 
tend to encourage its use. Milk is one of the best and 
cheapest of foods when in good order, but quite the 
reverse when improperly treated. Health is one result; 
bowel troubles the other. 

The wholesale price of bottled milk in New York 
and other cities is usually one-half cent to one cent per 
quart higher than for milk shipped in bulk. 

Butter quotations tell a story of their own. Butters 
known to the trade as ' ' creameries ' ' are divided into 
four grades, with just about a cent a pound between 
them. Going down the scale are the ' 'imitation cream- 



Io6 BIGGLE COW BOOK. 

eries," divided into three or four grades. The latter 
are genuine butter, but are of distinctly inferior quality. 
Then come the "special brands'' of various sorts. In 
the quotations before me at this writing (quotations 
issued by one of the greatest firms in America) I find 
prices for these special brands even better than 
"creamery ex.," which heads the list just mentioned. 

The moral is simple. It means that successful 
dairymen must get to the top of the market with a 
special brand. It is within reach of all who work for it. 
It is a matter of cleanliness, gumption and perse veran ce. 

Quality being equal, a small parcel usu-^jp|^n? 
ally commands a higher price than a large ^ig7iT~ 
parcel, for the simple reason that there are always more 
fifty-cent buyers than dollar buyers. Figure i shows a 
shipping crate containing 48 one-pound boxes of butter. 

In the cheese quotations (on the same sheet with 
the butter quotations) I find the best prices are com- 
manded by the full-cream brands which have made 
and kept good trade names. 

It has been a hobby with me for some years (a 
theory, mind, not based on personal experience) that 
there is room in America for many varieties of cheese 
put up in small attractive packages. My cheese-making 
experience is not wide, as to varieties, but I see the 
eagerness with which the American public buys articles 
of food which appeal to its fancy. A quarter or half 
dollar is sure to be spent for a toothsome article which 
appeals to the eye as well as to palate. 

The American dairyman must regard himself in 
more than one light. He is an individual engaged in 
money-earning work, for personal advantage, and he is 



POINTS ON MARKETS. IO^ 

itso a part of a great public which is sometimes called 
"the Government," or "America." The efforts of the 
individual are necessarily limited in their scope, but 
when aggregated under the larger term it is possible 
to do great things. 

There are good local markets for skimmilk, butter- 
milk, cottage cheese, etc., that can be developed by 
effort and good service. The local market is always 
worth having. 

As to selling cream wholesale there is promise a/ 
this time of a general movement in America toward 
what is known as the cream-gathering system. This 
plan has grown up since the advent of the hand sepa- 
rator. It leaves all the by-products on the farm, remov- 
ing only the cream, which is very low in fertility value. 
Hence the farm loses little or nothing, which is excep- 
tional, as almost all agricultural products carry away 
much fertility w r ith them. 

Under the cream-gathering system the most satis- 
factory way of making settlements is for the central 
factory to pay a uniform price per pound in cash for 
actual butter fat. 

CASH. 

Wrong, all wrong, that the United States should export more 
bogus butter than real butter. Let 's see to it. 

The milk producer should net at least half the retail pric^ 
every time. 

Poor butter paper molds the butter, and is a bad investment. 

New and bright utensils always please buyers. 

Many an article is sold by the neatness of its wrapper. 



ioS 



BIGGLE COW BOOK. 



Cuts of Beef and Veal. 

The United States Department of Agriculture has 
adopted the following terms for each of the different 
cuts of a butchered beef and veal. 




I. 


Third cut neck. 


13. 


Rump. 


2. 


Second cut neck. 


14. 


First cut round. 


3- 


First cut neck. 


15. 


Second cut round 


4- 


Third cut chuck ribs. 


16. 


Leg. 


5- 


Second cut chuck ribs. 


17. 


Top of sirloin. 


6. 


First cut chuck ribs. 


18. 


Flank. 


7- 


Third cut ribs. 


19- 


Navel. 


8. 


Second cut ribs. 


20. 


Plate. 


9- 


First cut ribs. 


21. 


Cross ribs. 


0. 


Small end sirloin. 


22. 


Brisket. 


1. 


Hip sirloin. 


23. 


Shin. 


2. 


Socket. 


24. 


Brisket. 




For Ca 


LVES. 




1. 


Neck. 


6. 


Breast. 


2. 


Chuck. 


7- 


Loin. 


3- 


Shoulders. 


8. 


Flank. 


4- 


Fore shank. 


9- 


Hind shank. 


5- 


Ribs. 







Chapter XXI. 
DAIRY APPLIANCES. 

No mere guesswork in the dairy. — John Tucker. 

There is not a more useful and profitable thing 
than the Babcock tester in the entire range of dairy 
appliances. This instrument, or series of instruments, 
fills a long-felt dairy want, and, I think, does its work 
more accurately, quickly and cheaply than anything 
else of its kind on the market. 

It is primarily useful in enabling the dairy man to 
know his cows and to accurately determine 
the cost of milk production. To the cream- 
en' man it is invaluable in the detection of 
waste, either in defective skimming or de- 
fective churning. There are several good ' 
testing systems on the market, including babcock 
the so-called Leffman-Beam andtheCoch- tester. 
ran, but I will describe only the Babcock, because it is 
in widest American use at this time. 

Briefly, the Babcock test is an apparatus for de- 
termining the amount of butter fat in milk ; or, it may 
be said, for determining the actual value of milk, 
because the value of milk depends on the total solids, 
and the total solids vary in amount as the fat varies in 
amount. 

One chemical (sulphuric acid) is required, and the 
process demands only ten or fifteen minutes of time. 




IIO BIGGLE COW BOOK. 

The cost per test is perhaps a quarter of a cent, and 
several tests can be made at once. 

The process is not patented, and any dairyman is 
at liberty to use it, including the centrifugal or whirling 
machine required for its operation. The Babcock 
appliances are for sale at all dairy supply stores at 
reasonable prices. 

Full and minute directions for operating the Bab- 
cock test are given in circulars sent out with the 
machine, and I need only describe the principle 
involved. 

A given amount of milk is placed in a test glass 
and the same amount of sulphuric acid added 
to it. A milk test glass is shown Number i, 
Figure i. The solution takes on a dark coffee 
color, owing to the action of the acid on the 
j milk sugar. The acid first precipitates the 
casein and then dissolves it. The fat is set 
free, and is not acted upon by the acid. 
Number 2, in Figure 1, shows the acid measure and 
Number 3 is the pipette for measuring the milk. 

The exact size of the test bottle is not impor- 
tant, but the size of the neck and the accuracy of 
the graduation marks are of vital importance. It 
is essential that precisely a given amount of milk 
be used in the sample bottle ; that enough acid be 
used to liberate the fat ; and that the amount of 
fat be accurately registered in the graduated neck 
of the bottle. 

The acid having been added to the milk, and 
mixed therewith, the bottles are placed in the pockets 
of the centrifugal machine and whirled for about five 




DAIRY APPLIANCES. Ill 

minutes, at the rate of say 900 revolutions per minute. 
The fat is thus all collected. 

In order to get the fat up into the tube, so as to 
be read, a little hot water is added, and the tube again 
whirled in the machine for a minute or two. The 
addition of this hot water will not affect the percentage, 
since the exact amount of milk is already known, and 
nothing remains except to get the fat into the accur- 
ately-marked neck. 

It is not even necessary that the fat should begin 
at the zero mark in the tube. It can as well extend 
from 2 to 6 as from o to 4. In either case there would 
clearly be 4 per cent, of fat in the sample of milk. 

Let it be understood that the neck of the test 
bottle (which is toward the centre of the whirling 
machine, when in motion) is so graduated as to accur- 
ately show percentage marks (of a milk sample 
weighing say 18 grams), regardless of the precise size 
of the bulb of the bottle. 

These percentage spaces on the neck of the bottle 
are each subdivided into five parts, each of which 
represents one-fifth or two-tenths of one per cent. 

Good skimming (gravity or separator) will take 
out all the butter fat from milk except about two-tenths 
of one per cent. In 100 pounds of 4 per cent, milk, 
yielding in theory 4 pounds of fat, this loss of two- 
tenths of one per cent, in skimming would amount to 
two-tenths of a pound of butter, or one-twentieth (5 
per cent. ) of the amount of butter fat in the whole 
milk. About as much is lost in churning, but the 
butter gains weight by carrying water, etc., with it in 
the final make-up. 



'12 BIGGLE COW BOOK. 

In actual creamery practice tests are made of com- 
posite samples of each customer's milk ; that is, of 
samples made day by day and kept in a jar, thus 
representing the average of a week or more. 

A special bottle is used for testing skimmilk. It 
has a side tube for the addition of the acid (a mere 
convenience), and the graduated neck is much 
ia | smaller than in ordinary test bottles. This is 
II done to make small amounts of fat more accur- 

k ately read. 

A so-called " oil test churn," for determin- 
ing the butter value of cream collected in the 
cream-gathering system of operating a butter factory, 
is now offered for sale. 

In this book I cannot mention even by name the 
thousand and one conveniences now on the | 
market. It is not my purpose to write a cata- 
logue for a dairy supply house, but rather to ^ ILK 

„ , - , STRAINER. 

tell how to read a catalogue. 

Beginning with the milk strainer, I must call atten- 
tion to a device in which the milk flow is upward instead 
of downward through the gauze. There are 
two gauzes or screens, and I like this imple- 
ment because it avoids pouring the milk di- 
r rectly upon the sediment arrested by the 
strainer, strainer. 

As to a milk cooler, I have already urged the choice 
of the one doing the work well and which can be most 
easily cleaned. This is equivalent to an endorsement 
of a cooler where the milk runs over an exposed cold 
surface, rather than through cold pipes. The objection 
to the former style is that the milk may absorb bacteria 








DAIRY APPLIANCES. 113 

from the air with which it comes so freely in contact, 
but this merely necessitates a cleanly atmosphere, apart 
from the cow stable. An exterior surface may be made 
clean, but the inside of a pipe is always liable to 
suspicion. 

The separator is now thoroughly established in 
American dairying, and several rival machines are 
upon the market. If we may believe the advertisements 
published by the owners of these separators it must be 
concluded that some of them are far less efficient than 
others. But if we may believe the testimony of the ex- 
periment station experts it is safe to buy any of them. 
The power separator has already worked a great 
change in American dairying, as shown 
by the establishment of thousands of 
creameries in the United States. 

The hand separator seems likely to 
work another change, almost as uni- 
versal, as indicated in the growth of what . 
is called the cream-gathering system. By 3 
the latter plan only the cream goes to the factory, 
instead of the whole milk as formerly. 

As to hand separators, I am quite willing to accept 
the verdict of the Pennsylvania station, to the 
effect that the trials (ending March 20, 1897) 
' showed very little if any difference in complete- 
ness of skimming and total amount of fat 
recovered in the cream. Considerable dif- 
ference was noted, however, in ease of opera- 
tion and apparent durability of the several 
separator, machines tested. No difference in character 
of cream was found, and the conclusion was reached 





114 BIGGLE COW BOOK. 

that the choice of a hand separator should depend 
largely on first cost and apparent durability. 

It is held by some dairymen that a separator pays 
with seven cows. 

There are several patterns of glass jars or 
bottles for the shipment of milk now upon the 
market, some with temporary and some with per- 
manent tops or lids. They are made in at least 
four sizes, from half pints up to half gallons. The 
bottle which most forcibly commends itself to me, 
from personal observation, is the one with a paste- 
board (or pulp) top; the top to be used but once. 
This top is water-proof and prevents the milk 
from spilling, and also prevents dust from enter- 
ing the bottle. 

There is a device for rapidly filling these 
comparatively small milk vessels; and wire 
baskets are made for carrying them. Boxes 
are provided for packing in ice, so that 
' the jars may be kept cool for a long 
time, and a foot-power washer has been 
bottle filler, constructed to facilitate quick and thor- 
ough cleansing of the returned vessels. 

Here is a cream stirrer good for putting the cream 
in the right condition for making gilt-edge butter. The 
bottom is from six to eight inches across, and the top 
two to three inches. It may be five to six inches high. 
A No. 9 wire, galvanized, is used for a handle, 
with which to push the mixer down and to lift it up 
in the mess of cream. The effect is to stir the 
cream and aerate it from the bottom to the top^ 
and to mix it most thoroughly. 




DAIRY APPLIANCES. 115 

Ice tubs for holding cans of cream are sold by the 
dealers in dairy supplies. The cream from such cans 
reaches the consumer in a highly attractive and 
palatable condition. 

I mention this merely to emphasize the fact that 
the retail trade (the best way to sell, where possible) 
is influenced almost wholly by little details of this kind. 
People buy what pleases them. 

It is impossible to enumerate the tin vessels used 
by dairymen, for these vessels are legion. I examine 
the catalogues with great interest, and frequently get 
useful ideas from these publications. Sometimes I can 
buy articles cheaper and better a thousand miles from 
home than in the city nearest to me ; and these cata- 
logues tell me what other dairymen demand. Of 
course every article in the many-paged catalogue repre- 
sents somebody's thought and experience. 

A handy thing in any dairy is a good 
circulating boiler for hot water as shown 
in the illustration. 

It was a good idea, for instance, for me 
to buy some large, plainly-printed signs of 
* ' buttermilk, " " cottage cheese, " " fresh 
butter," etc., which were mentioned in one 
of the catalogues. They cost me but a few cents, and 
increased my sales in market. 

Another thing, first seen in the catalogues, was the 
convenient "milk sack," made of water-proof manilla 
paper. I use them for retailing the above products, 
including skimmilk, to people who would otherwise go 
past my stall on account of having neither kettles nor 
pitchers with them. 




Il6 BIGGLE COW BOOK. 

There is a milk-can jacket advertised for the pre- 
vention of freezing in cold weather ; a " power," espe- 
cially built for bulls, to run the separator ; a low-priced 
steamer or boiler, for steaming feeds ; and a small and 
cheap boiler and engine. These things, once to be 
had only of various dealers (or not at all), can now 
be found in all the dairy supply stores. 

Finally, as to dairy cleanliness, let me advise wash- 
ing, scalding, rinsing and sunning, in the order named. 
Dairy implements, of all things, must be kept sweet. 

ORDERLIES. 

Sunlight and fresh air and hot water are the cardinal factors 
in cleanliness. 

The odor of whitewash is the only allowable smell in milk 
house or creamery. 

There are many good butter workers on the market. Buy 
that one which has greatest simplicity. Keep it clean. 

Printing butter is as much of an art as stamping gold coins. 

It is a great help in keeping a cow clean in the stable to shear 
off the long hairs of her tail. 

Getting milk frozen hauling it to the creameries is one cause 
of poor butter. On very cold days the cans should be covered on 
the way to the creamery. 

Sunlight is death to bacteria. 

When limited cash compels a dairy owner to do his own work, 
instead of hiring it done, it is generally well done. 

Keep things clean on the outside of the creamery. Ill odors 
tell of lost fertility. 

The milk wagon is an advertisement on wheels. Make it 
attractive. 

In all the range of household work no occupation is more 
graceful for girls than butter making. 

Neat prints will add ten per cent, to the price of butter. 
Most manufacturers think ten per cent, a big profit. 

One of the standard doctrines of modern dairy practice is that 
disinfectants can never take the place of simple old-fashioned 
cleanliness. 

Have you tried clipping the hair from the hind legs of the 
cows so they won't get clogged with dung? 




Chapter XXII. 
THE PUBLIC CREAMERY. 

Don't hurry the cows and then waste time at the creamery. — 

John Tucker. 

A public creamery should be 
a public convenience, saving much 
drudgery. Managed properly, il 
may be profitable, a good thing 
in many ways for the community. 
power churn. Success depends wholly upon an 
abundance of cream and judicious management. Any 
town may have a prosperous creamery if resident men 
of average ability can be interested and at least 400 
good cows absolutely pledged. The risks in the busi- 
ness have been lessened greatly by the Babcock system, 
the manager paying for only the fats he can make into 
a salable article. No creamery can be run on a per- 
manent basis of profit without the Babcock test or some 
method equally reliable. All dangers to the life of the 
enterprise have not been removed and never can be. 
Tact in management is priceless. There are still many 
sharks to avoid, who would wreck the owner or the 
organization in building, in equipping, or in both 
together, or in receiving consignments and making 
inadequate returns or none. Many creameries have 
been fitted up at $5000 to $8000 that should not have 
cost over $3000 to $4500. And of course any concern 
expected to pay reasonable dividends upon twice as 



THE PUBLIC CREAMERY. 119 

much stock as necessary could make but a poor show- 
ing ; the patrons would get dissatisfied and withdraw, 
making the supply of milk inadequate, and forcing 
operations to stop. A creamery closed is hard to re- 
open, as the confidence of the public must be regained. 

Any individual or association of farmers convinced 
that a creamery can be added safely and profitably to 
the institutions of the place, should not inaugurate one 
hastily. A careful canvass should be made to ascertain 
how many dairies there are whose owners will pledge 
themselves in writing to furnish milk from a stated 
number of cows the first year. Any grants of land, 
material and labor that public-spirited citizens may 
make should be received gratefully. 

Sometimes stockholders desire to pay for stock in 
this way which they could not own otherwise. Ex- 
perience proves that the best way is not to place the 
contract for building and equipping with some concern 
making a specialty of such things but to hire local 
carpenters and masons of good repute under contracts 
with carefully drawn plans and specifications and to 
buy the boiler, engine, tanks, separators, pipes, valves, 
etc. , where they can be secured to the best advantage, 
quality considered. An equipment second-hand and 
nearly new is offered frequently at a price that will 
make its acceptance profitable. 

Location is everything in keeping down labor bills, 
for an unhandy creamery or one too large or too small 
will require an extra hand, and here is a big leak in 
good management. Location influences quality largely, 
and only butter of finest flavor brings the highest price. 
Since strictest cleanliness is essential, it is obvious that 



120 BIGGLE COW BOOK. 

the creamery must not stand in a swamp, nor where 
good drainage is not feasible. Wash water or milk if 
not carried completely away will pollute the air in three 
days. If the creamery is situated so large quantities 
of milk may be received and handled with little effort 
on the part of the help, the milk running by its own 
weight from the receiving room through strainers, vats, 
separators, and again into the owners' wagons, without 
pumping or lifting, much is gained. Site, plan, equip- 
ment, locating just right upon the site — all these should 
be studied for months and many other plants visited 
before a stick or brick is bought, or any contract given. 
A studious contemplation of and comparison with 
other creameries often reveal defects that may be 
remedied easily in the plan before it is executed. A 
large plant, suited to handling the milk from 1200 to 
1500 cows, erected after such careful consideration, is 
shown. It is run partly upon the whole milk and partly 
upon the gathered plan and is a success. The whole 
milk plan makes each dairy send its milk to the cream- 
ery or to one of its separating stations at a stated time, 
usually once per day, and is in wide use in the West, 
while but little practised in the East. In the gathering 
plan followed east and west the creamery sends teams 
to collect the cream which is raised on the farm by 
some system of setting or by hand separators. There 
is but little difference in the methods followed east 
and west, the old principle of cleanliness recognized 
by our forefathers and mothers being considered the 
great secret of success everywhere. 

The creamery whose plan is shown here is 30 x 60 
feet, built in a side hill and the system of gravity used 



THE PUBLIC CREAMERY. 



121 



from start to finish. The whole milk that is received 
is weighed in on the top floor, not shown, heated, and 
piped down, down and out. A, is the fuel house ; B, 
the office ; C, the ice house, 20 x 20 feet and 26 feet 
deep, holding 200 tons ; D, a cool room adjoining the 
cooler E ; F, windows ; G, doors ; H, a pier running 
out to load butter and cream from ; 1, is the engine ; 
2, boiler ; 3, separators ; 4, cream cooler ; 5, Babcock 
tester, the line shaft shown crossing it is 10 feet above 
it ; 6, steps to the half story where separators and 



r 


2 




1 !. F1RF1 


C 5 

1 n 


A 1 


* pl-llU 


L^^q^r 


N tr 






r 


<+^^ r t t 


<i 



w 



•PLAN-OP-CREAMCW* 



cream vats 7 are kept ; 8, is 300 gallon box churn into 
which cream is run from vats ; 9, pulley to run butter 
worker 10 ; 11, sink ; 12, pasteurizing outfit ; 13, drain 
to which everything falling on work room floor runs. 
Another drain catches the buttermilk let out of the 
churn and leads it to a distance where it is put into 
barrels on a wagon and finds its way to a large piggery. 
Eastern or New England creameries market their 
butter direct to stores and hotels, sending by express 



122 BIGGLE COW BOOK. 

in single cases at a time, mostly in pound prints 
wrapped in parchment, instead of through commission 
houses, as western creameries do. 

A large supply of cold sweet water is among 
essentials. Prosperous creamery managers every- 
where have learned the importance of securing and 
retaining a buttermaker of highest ability, faithfulness 
and integrity. 

Rigid rules should be adopted for the government 
of patrons in their management of stables, cows and 
milk. The following are excellent : 

Cows should be driven quietly and treated gently for best re- 
sults, should have pure water in abundance and none that is stag- 
nant. 

Salt regularly. Udders should be washed often. 

Milk should be aired immediately by pouring or dipping and 
then cooled as quickly as possibly to 6o° or lower. 

No morning's milk should be mixed with night's milk until 
chilled. 

Pails and cans should be washed with warm, not hot, water to 
get all milk from the seams and then scalded. 

Milkers never should milk with wet hands. 

Other rules may be added suited to the locality 
adopting these. 

GOSSIP. 

Dairying requires the strength of a man and the patience of a 
woman. 

Skimmilk should be kept on the farm ; not given away. 

The Thomas Parker Creamery, of Lawrence, Kansas, is one of 
many similar large plants. It has 27 skimming stations, and a 
cream car with its attendant makes daily collections, testing the 
cream en route. The great St. Albans, Vt., creamery runs 67 sep- 
arators and gathers mostly by rail. 

The Babcock test has routed the unjust payment by space and 
the old pooling of milk plan. It pays for the actual fat in the 
milk, and careful breeding and wise feeding are encouraged. 







Chapter XXIII. 
VILLAGER'S ONE COW. 

With a good cow a?id a good kitchen garden any family is 
rich. — Dorothy. 

The keeper of one cow or two cows cares but 
little for the chemistry of feeds or 
the arithmetic of dairying, but is 
interested mainly in getting the 
most and best milk for the least 
money. I will therefore present a 
few rations without fully discussing their make-up. 
Pasture grass is the summer mainstay of the one- 
cow dairy, and pasture grass is an almost perfect cow 
food. The grass is usually supplemented with a little 
bran and corn meal. Bran is rich in protein, which 
goes direct to the milk pail ; corn meal is more apt to 
lodge on the ribs in the form of fat. 

All the edible waste from the kitchen should go 
to cow, pig or chickens ; and if pigs or chickens are 
not kept the cow will do much toward saving the waste 
of good food. She will eat many vegetables, either 
cooked or raw ; and even skimmilk may be used to 
advantage in her feed box, upon cut feed of any kind. 
The waste from the garden, including all corn- 
stalks, makes good cow feed ; and the mowings of 
the yard can be advantageously disposed of in the 
same way. The family cow can be petted and pampered 
in a manner quite impossible with a herd, and with 
highly satisfactory results. 



124 



BIGGLE COW BOOK. 



If there is room to pasture the cow, so much the 
better. Otherwise an amazing amount of succulent 
fodder can be produced on a few square rods of 
ground, and cut as required. Always grow roots, such 
as mangels and sugar beets. Pumpkins are excellent. 
Cabbages, turnips and such things may be fed in mod- 
eration, after milking. 

No one has any right to allow stock to run at large. 
pjNo one is obliged to 
rfence stock out of, or 
■off their lands. Every 
lone is liable for all 
■damages their animals 
5do, if allowed to run at 
I large, or for trespass 
I upon others' lands. 
I Animals must be guard- 
minding the roadside cow. ed or fenced in upon 
their owner's lands. This is common law. In New 
York State road fences are being taken up, and the 
grounds about dwellings are not enclosed. This saves 
money and adds to the appearance of the farms. 

A cow consumes of good hay (or its equivalent) 
about 3 per cent, of her live weight daily ; or, in other 
terms, the ration should include say 2 pounds of coarse, 
bulky food (hay, fodder, etc.) and 1 pound of grain 
per day per 100 pounds of weight of cow. 

I would use twice as much bran as corn meal (by 
weight) in making up a ration for a cow in milk. Of 
course the corn meal would be necessary in larger 
proportion in fattening an animal. 

The family cow varies a good deal in weight. 










villager's one cow. 125 

Perhaps 1000 pounds would not be much above the 
American average, and the ration may be figured 
accordingly. Here is a winter ration, to be divided 
and used so as to cover a day : 

15 pounds clover hay, 
10 " wheat bran, 
5 " corn meal. 
(Nutritive ratio about 1: 5.6). 

This is a good ration, but not the cheapest. It 
may be supplemented with a few chopped sugar beets 
or other roots, or with chopped pumpkins or apples. 
The private dairyman as a rule does not have access 
to ensilage, which yields succulent food where large 
herds are to be supplied. 

It does not require a big milker to average 10 
quarts per day for six months and 5 quarts per day for 
four months. This makes a total of say 5160 pounds and 
gives the cow a resting period of eight weeks. 

The one-cow dairyman must continue to depend 
on the shallow pan system of setting milk ; a very good 
plan where things are kept clean. 

As to churning, I say churn often. Churn three 
times a week for the best butter. Churn twice a week 
for good butter. Ripen the cream at least 24 hours ; 
then churn at a temperature of 65 ° < 
in winter or 6o° in summer. Much 
is lost by allowing cream to stand 
after it is ripe. An egg beater 
will answer for churning a small 
amount of cream. this kind. 

The so-called grade or part thoroughbred is an 
ideal family cow. My preference includes some 01 the 






126 



BIGGLE COW BOOK. 




Channel Islands blood, blended with any other good 

stock. 

Cows appreciate kindness, and will repay it. A 

good grooming will sometimes be quickly followed 

by an increased milk flow. 

A fly sheet on the family cow will add to her com- 
fort, and tend to larger productiveness and more 

desirable milk for family use. 

Here is a plan of a village barn suitable for a horse, 

cow and carriage. It is about 20 

feet square, and the shed attached 

12x20. The floor shown through 

the open door gives ample room 

for carriages, sleigh, the lawn 

mower, etc., besides room to unhitch, and clean har- 
ness. The harness closet is on the 
barn floor near the vehicles where no 
ammonia from the stables can reach 
it. The horse can be taken from the 
floor directly into the stable without 

going out of doors. 



GENTLENESS. 

The dewlap is that hanging portion of the neck which during 
grazing " laps the dew." 

Always have fodder corn in midsummer. 

No animal responds to good treatment so quickly as the cow. 
Favors are acknowledged in terms of milk. 

The villager's cow must be quiet and docile. 

Teach the cow to submit to a halter, and to follow easily 
when led. 

The lone cow often bellows for water. Keep her quiet by 
supplying her reasonable needs. 

Some cows are permanently discontented when alone. Such 
animals do best in herds. 

Never touch the butter with the hands. 



■ 





Chapter XXIV. 
THE MILK FARM. 

Give all the clover possible. — John Tucker. 

My object in conducting a milk farm is to make 
money ; not merely to work out 
new theories of dairy practice. 
Still, I must confess to more than 
one change of method within the 
past quarter century, on account 
! of altered commercial conditions. 
My fundamental rule is to 
the old spring house, grow nearly everything at home, 
and to sell off the least possible amount of fertility. 
The farm is the source of raw materials, the dairy is 
the factor}- where goods are made up, the cows are 
the laborers, and I am the business manager. Of 
course I never hesitate to sell farm produce when 
prices are good, for then I can buy artificial manures. 
But my main reliance for fertility is the covered 
manure shed, where all manure is piled up in neat and 
compact form. 

My cows are all home-raised ; not that this plan 
is so much cheaper, but because it is so much more 
satisfactory than any other. There is a deal of pleasure 
in shaping the career of a heifer calf two or more 
generations in advance of her birth ; and I have 
animals where three generations pasture side by side 
and vie with each other in the dairy — with the grand- 
daughters leading. I try to breed for winter milkers. 



128 BIGGLE COW BOOK. 

Dehorning is practised. A little caustic on the 
calf's head nips the horns in the bud. Some day, no 
doubt, polled, or hornless bulls, will be relied upon for 
the dehorning process. I read that a Galloway bull 
will get hornless calves 99 times out of 100, from horned 
cows ; but I use a lighter-built bull in my herd of milk 
cows, and such bulls have horns. If the feeling against 
horned cows continue, we shall presently hear of polled 
Jerseys and polled Guernseys; but such strains are not 
yet in the market. The only objection to dehorning 
that I have yet heard (outside of the operation itself) 




A CORNER OF A MILK FARM. 

is that hornless cows crowd together too closely in the 
pasture field, and may suffer from overheating on 
very sultry days in summer. 

I rely mainly on timothy, clover, Kentucky blue 
grass and corn fodder ; but of course I have accepted 
the silo and ensilage. And I am quite sure that 
crimson clover has come to stay as far north as southern 
Pennsylvania, and that other leguminous plants must 
be recognized in our farm and dairy calculations. 

I make no violent or sudden changes in my farming 
operations, but shall be wide awake to what other 



THE MILK FARM. 129 

dairymen are doing in the way of growing leguminous 
plants either for feeding, for ensilage, or for green 
manuring. If pea vines and vetches are really worth 
as much as the concentrated mill feeds, I propose to 
save part of the feed bills. 

Improvement can assuredly be made in our pasture 
lands, both in preparation of the soil and in choice of 
grass seeds. The soil preparation should involve 
some manuring (as much as possible) and a greater 
variety of grasses. Different grasses mature at different 
dates, and the season of good grazing can be prolonged 
by a wise choice of seeds. For a grazing field for cows, 
in addition to the usual timothy and red clover, I use 
Kentucky blue grass, herd's-grass, and white clover. 

It may be urged that some of these things come of 
themselves, but I sow them when the ground is pre- 
pared. It pays. Indeed, it will pay to sow grass 
seeds without a grain crop of any kind, on manured 
soil. Alfalfa does quite well where the subsoil is por- 
ous. It is a clover in fact. I sow corn for summer 
soiling ; also millet. 

The milk farm should produce roots for stock 
feeding, especially where ensilage is not used. Sugar 
beets and mangels are desirable, and when sown in 
rows and well cultivated by horse power 
an enormous tonnage per acre may be 
harvested. Turnips, rutabagas and ^ 
carrots are also desirable adjuncts to the 
rations of a stall-fed cow ; five to ten pounds per day 
per head is a sufficient amount of roots. Mangels 
should be ripened by storage before being fed. Apples, 
potatoes, pumpkins, etc., also have a place in the 




iL 



130 BIGGLE COW BOOK. 



.. 



autumn and winter ration, and are excellent when fed 
in moderation and with good judgment. Corn fodder 
should be housed or else compactly stacked near the 
barn ; otherwise it is injured by the weather. Dairy- 
men must learn to balance their own cow rations from 
the feeds at their command. 



MILK TALK. 

There 's money in the pea plant and its allies — the beans, tares 
and vetches. Clover is in close kinship too. 

Grow all the clover possible. 

Eighty per cent, of the manurial value of foods is returned in 
the manure. Take care of it. 

Cows with leaky teats should be milked three times a day. 

It is poor policy to teach a cow to let her milk down only when 
being fed. 

Throw a ripped-open fertilizer bag over a fly-teased cow at 
milking time. 

Many a man has made many a penny by combining calf with 
skimmilk. 

Keep the cow's fly brush clean. 

Pure water, not tainted water, for the cow's beverage. 

Remember the salt. Use a little powdered sulphur, too, when 
salting the young stock. 

If a cow is not a deep drinker she cannot be a deep milker. 

Never before has so much been expected of the cow. Now 
she will not pass muster with a high test and a long pedigree. 
She must give also a fair quantity and be an all-the-year-round 
milker. 

The day has gone by when it is considered cheaper to buy a 
cow than to raise one. Not that there are not cows (things) for 
sale, but the thinking dairyman knows how hard it is to find 
profitable cows, even at ruinous prices. 

The output of choice butter and cheese is enormous, but the 
demand for it is still more enormous, -and on the increase. Lucky 
the man who can lead in quality or in a choice specialty. 

To know how to get the largest cash return from home grown 
stuff, usually roughage, by combining it with the right kind and 
quantity of bought foods, is to know how to make the dairy pay. 

Milk is wasted at the rate of half a pint to a quart per cow by 
some milkers because they fail to hold the pail properly while 
milking. The loss occurring twice daily is a big one in a year. 



Chapter XXV. 
AILMENTS AND REMEDIES. 

Good care is the farmer'' s best cow doctor. — Dorothy. 

Let sick or maimed animals lie still. Do not tor- 
ture them by trying to get them up. Rub their limbs 
every day and keep a soft bed under them. They will 
get up when they are able. 

If a cow look poor and weak, put a blanket on 
her, keep her in a warm place, and feed her some corn 
meal and middlings, and some oats. Give her warm 
drink, and stir a little cheap flour in it. Do not let her 
run clear down. Look ahead. 

If cows are accidentally left out in a rain and seem 
cold, put them in the stable as soon as possible and 
rub them well. If they shiver, put blankets on them 
until they are dry. If there is inflammation or hardness 
in the udder, bathe it thoroughly for at least half an 
hour, and rub gently until thoroughly dry. 

If this does not effect a cure put a warm flaxseed 
, poultice on the udder, which can be 
held in place by means of an eight- 
\ tailed bandage. This should be 
^changed twice a day until the hard- 
ness and soreness are gone. Of course, the cow 
should be milked out two or three times each day. 

Now I will speak of some vices and their cure. 
Vicious bulls are generally rendered civil by dehorning. 
A ring in the nose is sufficient in some animals. To 
put ring in nose secure the animal by tying securely 





132 BIGGLE COW BOOK. 

by a rope around the horns. With a sharp knife ov 
large sack needle puncture the membrane between 
the nostrils and insert the ring. A few links of heavy 
chain fastened to the ring by a spring hook is useful 
in very bad animals. 

To keep bulls from injuring or killing persons, in 
place of dehorning fix a blind over the eyes, of 
stout, heavy leather, attached to a head halter. It 
will make the animal comparatively harmless. The 
same plan will prevent fence-break- 
ing in any of the cattle kind. See . 
that the fastening does not cut the 
skin around the horns. It may be 
said that dehorning will quite an- " THE 
swer, but this is a mistake. Watch the muley bull. 

Or fasten a light but strong stick or slat from tip 
to tip of horns. A strip of oak or hickory, or other 
tough wood, one and a quarter inches thick, one 
and three-quarters to two inches wide and two 
inches longer than the extreme width of horns is all 
sufficient. Bore a hole in each end to admit the tips 
of the horns and fasten on with screws, and the job 
is complete. 

A cow that sucks herself is a bother. She may 
be prevented doing so by a necklace made from old 
broom or fork handles, strung on a strap and 
buckled around the neck. It should be fitted 
^to the cow and the sticks made long enough 
to keep her from putting her head on her side and not 
long enough to chafe the shoulders or throat when the 
head is not turned ; or a hollow bit may be used; or a 
wide leather around the nose filled with sharp nails 





AILMENTS AND REMEDIES. I33 

pointing outward. Sew on a strap to buckle over the 
top of the head. 

Cows become kickers through training, not by in- 
herent badness. A strap placed as in the f*~~f\ 
picture and buckled tight will stop her kick- 
ing. A kicker is not benefited by cruelty ; 
try kind treatment ; if it fail, try again. 

If cows are found gnawing bones in the pasture 
when they should be eating grass or chewing the cud, 
it shows that something is wrong with the herd or the 
pasture. 

Steers and dry cows rarely acquire the habit, and 
it is more common in extra good than in poor milkers. 
It usually prevails where cows have been kept in the 
same pasture many years by day and taken out nights. 
It may not be cured at once by changing to richer feed, 
but I have never known cows to chew bones very long 
after being given abundant rations of wheat bran and 
clover hay, or other food containing abundant propor- 
tions of bone-making material which the milk must 
have. 

If cows are not fed a variety of food they will eat 
horse manure to get the salts out of it. In the horse 
manure are soda, magnesia, salt, phosphoric acid, 
potash, nitrogen and lime. Give such cows bran, salt 
and fine meal. 



OF DEHORNING. 
This may be done at any age, but best done as soon as the horn 
buttons are perceptible, by touching the young horn and surround- 
ing skin with a stick of caustic potash. Wrap the caustic Stic* 
with paper to protect the fingers, moisten the unwrapped end with 
water and apply to a circular spot not larger than a silver quarter 



134 BIGGLE COW BOOK. 

dollar. Vinegar is a good antidote to caustic potash and should be 
applied at once to hands or any part of skin accidentally touched. 

Young horns may also be removed by strong knife before the 
horn becomes tightly fastened. Make a circular cut around the 
horn, then cut well beneath it and lift the young horn out. 

Horns of adult cattle may be removed by a sharp saw, but the 
dehorning implements now in the market are much better. The 
advantages of dehorning are that the animals become more docile, 
the timid ones in the herd are not annoyed, and cruelty is not 
practised upon one another. 

OF THE DIGESTIVE ORGANS. 

If a cow get a foreign body in the mouth turn her head towards 
the light and remove it. 

For Choking, examine throat and neck; if offending object is 
felt, attempt to force upward into the mouth by pressure of hands 
below the object. Give one pint linseed oil or melted lard. May 
sometimes reach with hand by holding tongue aside. Do not push 
a stiff stick or fork handle down the throat; a piece of rubber hose, 
well greased, is less likely to ruin the cow. 

If a cow has Bloat or Hoven there will be a drum-like swelling 
on left side in front of hip, caused by green food, wet or frosted 
clover, overfeeding, choking. Give one-half teacupful table salt 
in water, as drench. Exercise. If not relieved give aromatic 
spirits of ammonia, two ounces, well diluted, every hour. 

s^ Where there is great danger of suffocation a punc- 



fig. i. ture of the paunch may be made with a knife or better 
yet by an instrument here shown (Fig. i.), the trocar and canula. 

It consists of a sharp blade in a tube about half 

an inch in diameter and eight inches long. 
When the puncture is made the trocar is with- 
drawn and the tube remains, allowing the gas 
to escape. Fig. 2 shows the point , equally d is- 
tant from the point of hip and last rib, where 
puncture should be made on left side of cow. 

Impaction of Paunch is caused by over- fig. 

eating, and the symptoms are failing appetite, solid or doughy 
swelling on front of left hip. Give one to two pounds Glauber salts 
dissolved in water; follow every three hours by drench of mixture 
of equal parts common salt, mix vomica powdered and capsicum. 
Dose, one tablespoonful. 




AILMENTS AND REMEDIES. 135 

In Colic the symptoms are uneasiness, striking belly with 
hind legs, lying down and getting up. Cause, change of diet, rapid 
feeding. Give Glauber salts, one pound in water ; warm water 
enemas. Give every hour one ounce each of laudanum and 
sulphuric ether, diluted. 

Constipation caused by dry, coarser food and lack of exer- 
cise, is treated with green food, linseed meal and exercise; give 
pint of raw linseed oil. Diarrhoea is treated with starch gruel or 
flour and water and dry food. 

Scours in calves is caused by overfeeding, bad food or drink, 
damp stables, dirty surroundings. Remove cause and withhold 
food the best remedy. Give once daily twenty grains potassium per- 
manganate in tincup of water; also use same for enema. 

Cows are subject to Founder, showing sudden tenderness in 
two or more feet ; feet hot and may crack around top of hoof. This 
comes from overfeeding. Give Glauber salts one pound, twenty 
drops tincture aconite every two hours. Keep feet moist by wet 
pasture or wet cloths. 

Garget or Swollen Udder, due to cold, injuries, overfeeding 
or heating food. Bathe frequently with warm water; dry, and 
apply warm lard. Milk often. Give internally two-drachm doses 
salicylic acid and one drachm soda bicarbonate in one pint of 
milk four times daily. See note, page 140. 

OF THE BREATHING ORGANS. 

Discharge of Mucus from nostrils indicates catarrh from 
exposure, dust, or pollen of plants. Allow animal to breathe steam 
from water containing pine tar. 

In Sore Throat there is difficulty in swallowing, food returns 
Ihrough nostrils. Steam as in catarrh, give tincture belladonna 
one-half ounce every six hours. Rub throat with equal parts 
turpentine and sweet oil. 

In Bronchitis there is dry cough first, then loose, and dis- 
charge from nostrils ; rattling sound in windpipe. Steam as in 
sore throat and give tincture aconite twenty drops every two hours 
and two drachms muriate ammonia in one pint of water three times 
daily. For bronchitis in young stock due to worms in windpipe, 
which sometimes occur in autumn where they are pastured late, 
give one ounce turpentine and six ounces sweet oil well mixed, 
three times a week. Take from pasture and feed liberally. 



I36 BIGGLE COW BOOK. 

In Pneumonia there is loss of appetite, animal standing, rapid 
breathing, pulse frequent, extremities cold. Cause, exposure 01 
neglected bronchitis. Place in a warm, dry, well-ventilated stable, 
apply to chest equal parts turpentine and alcohol and cover with 
blanket. In beginning give tincture aconite twenty drops every 
hour. It not better in two days discontinue aconite and give one 
ounce tr. digitalis every eight hours. 

In PLEURISY there is fever with rapid pulse, animal stands, 
grunts on moving or when chest is struck, has a short painful 
cough. Treat same as tor pneumonia; give also one drachm 
iodide of potash twice daily. 

OF THE SKIN. 

SORE TEATS are caused by scratches from briers, bites of in- 
sects, dirt, exposure, also from the contagion oi cow pox at milk- 
ing. Remove cause and use milk tube if necessary; apply to sores 
after milking small quantity of mixture glycerine four ounces and 
carbolic acid one drachm. In COW pox milk affected cow last and 
apply to sores mixture glycerine tour ounces, water eight ounces, 
chloride oi zinc twenty grains. 

War rs on teats or other parts are generally easily removed by 
sharp scissors; dress wound as advised for sore teats. 

M INGE causes great itching and generally starts at root of tail 
or top oi neck ; cause, a minute parasite. Wash with soap and 
water and dry, after which apply lard which destroys the parasite. 

For Lick and Ticks apply daily a tea made by adding one 
pound quassia chips to three gallons oi boiling water. Ordinary 
sheep dip is also effective. Carbolic acid is one oi the most effec- 
tive agents against parasites. It should have a dilution oi about 
one hundred times its bulk of water. Kerosene emulsion is good 

for lice on cattle, killing both adults and eggs. To make, dissoh e 
one-half pound hard soap in one gallon hot water and while still 
near the boiling point add two gallons kerosene oil. Churn or 
agitate until emulsified. Use one part of this emulsion to eight or 
ten parts of water ami use as a Spray, wash or dip. 

In RINGWORM there are circular spots of baldness covered by 
gray <>r yellow crust; caused also by a parasite. Wash with Strong 
SOap .ind water ami apply pure creolin once daily for a week. 

Fori Claw or Hoof Distemper causes lameness in one or 

more feet, swelling and heat around top ofhoof, and bad smelling 






AILMENTS AND REMEDIES. I37 

discharge around edge of hoof and between the claws. Cause, dirty 
stables, standing in stagnant water or mud. Trim off all loose 
horn, clean by wiping with dry rags, wet sores twice daily with 
mixture chloride of zinc one ounce, water one pint. 

Overgrowth of Hoof from standing in stable should be filed 
off with rasp. 

OF VARIOUS INJURIES. 

When chaff or other dirt gets into the eye syringe or sponge 
the eye frequently with clean cold water containing sulphate of 
zinc one grain to each ounce of water. Keep stable darkened. 

Sprains (generally below knee or hock), causing heat 
and lameness with tenderness at point of injury, should be 
bathed with warm water or with laudanum three parts, lead 
water one part. 

Wounds, if bleeding much, fill or cover the wound with clean 
cotton dipped in cold or quite warm water, and secure firmly with 
bandage; examine for foreign bodies, as splinters, nails and dirt. 
Do not fill wound with cobwebs to stop bleeding. Remove the 
bandage before swelling takes place ; one application of bandage 
usually enough. Keep animal quiet first day, then allow exercise. 
Keep wound clear and apply carbolic acid water 5 per cent, or 
creolin and water 1 to 10. Do not apply grease to wounds. If proud 
flesh forms apply daily enough powdered burnt alum to cover. 

For an Abscess or cavity containing pus caused by bruises, 
etc., open freely and syringe with 10 per cent, creolin solution. 

Lockjaw, a constant muscular spasm involving more or less 
the entire body, is caused by the entrance of tetanus germs through 
a wound. There is stiffness of whole or part of body, more fre- 
quently the jaws, making eating difficult or impossible. If animal 
can drink give one-half ounce doses bromide potash five times 
daily; dissolve and place on food or gruel or in water given to 
drink. Do not drench, and keep quiet. 

OF THE GENERATIVE ORGANS. 

Inversion of Vagina most frequent in springers, caused most 
frequently by stalls too low behind. Treat displaced parts with 
warm water and replace them. Place cow in stall eight inches 
higher behind than in front until after calving. 

Inversion of Womb occurs after calving, same cause as above 
and treatment the same; get womb placed well forward. 



I38 BIGGLE COW BOOK. 

Sterility in bull is sometimes caused by high feeding and 
lack of exercise. Give nux vomica one drachm and capsicum one- 
half drachm once daily. In cow may be temporary, following 
abortion ; if from other cause, seldom recover. Try same remedy 
as for bull. 

Abortion is a frequent and troublesome malady, occurring 
generally at about seventh or eighth month. Cause may be due 
to injuries or to contagion. Separate at once when suspected; 
after calf is born syringe the womb with one gallon of warm water 
containing one ounce creolin. Repeat daily as long as any 
discharge is seen. Afterbirth should be removed about third day 
after calving. Disinfect stables thoroughly. Do not let cow take 
bull for at least two months after aborting. 

Retained Afterbirth is generally due to premature birth; 
should be removed on third or fourth day. Blanketing, warm 
stable, warm drinks may help. If necessary to remove by hand, 
should only be attempted by qualified person, otherwise it is 
advisable to allow it to remain. 

Inflammation of the Womb is indicated by fever, loss of 
appetite, straining. Caused by injuries in calving or to attempts 
at removal of afterbirth, and is generally fatal. Give two drachms 
salicylate of soda every four hours and syringe womb with warm 
water and two ounces creolin to the gallon. 

*Milk Fever or Parturient Apoplexy is usually treated by 
inflation of the udder with air. The remedy appears to stand the 
test of time and saves all affected cows that have not been neglected 
until the disease has advanced too far. Doubtless a regular "milk 
fever outfit," costing about $3, is best to use, as it precludes the 
possibility of infecting the sensitive interior of the udder. But in 
emergency, or in case the outfit is not procurable, the udder may- 
be inflated by using a bicycle or automobile air pump, taking 
pains to be sure the air used is pure. If in a stable, ventilate it well. 

Atlach a milking tube to the tubing of the pump, first dipping 
it in a carbolic solution, (carbolic acid three teaspoons, water one 
pint) . Wash each teat carefully with this antiseptic, before inflat- 
ing it, so as to prevent infection. Insert the milking tube carefully. 
Work slowly. 

Of course the udder must not be inflated unreasonably. After 
inflation, remove the tube and leave the udder full of air for five 
to eight hours. Then the air may be worked out gently, and, if 
necessary, the inflation may be repeated. 



AILMENTS AND REMEDIES. I39 

Cows so treated usually show marked signs of improvement 
within two hours. 

OF SOME OTHER SERIOUS MALADIES. 

Tuberculosis — Consumption is a contagious disease caused 
by a germ called "Bacillus Tuberculosis." The symptoms are 
not well marked in early stages ; advanced cases show loss of 
flesh, a short, dry cough, diarrhoea, irregular appetite, enlarge- 
ments about throat, head or in udder, and also symptoms of bron- 
chitis, pleurisy and pneumonia when these diseases frequently 
become complications. Generally requires months or even years 
to destroy the victims; all the while the patient may communicate 
the disease to other animals and to man. This disease can be 
detected in its earliest stages by injection of tuberculin, after 
which the temperature in the affected animal is elevated. The 
test is very delicate and trustworthy in experienced hands. There 
being no known cure for tuberculosis, and the products of diseased 
animals being unsafe to use, the true course is to first apply the 
tuberculin test, which is done by many states without expense to 
the owner, and diseased cattle killed and paid for; and second, 
thoroughly disinfect stables to prevent reappearance. 

Actinomycosis (Lump Jaw) is a contagious disease due to a 
germ known as "Ray fungus." There are well-defined swellings 
about the jaw, head and throat, or may be on the tongue or in the 
lungs. These soften and open after a time and discharge matter; 
appetite good until well advanced. The treatment is, remove by 
surgical means ; late experiments indicate iodide of potash two 
to three drachms daily to be a cure. Advanced cases should be 
killed at once. The meat should never be used for food. 

Milk Sickness (Trembles) is a disease of cattle communi- 
cable to man and other animals by use of meat or milk ; dry cattle 
most commonly and far more severely affected. Milch cows may 
transmit this disease through the use of their milk and yet show 
no trace of the disease themselves. The symptoms are trembling 
upon least exertion as walking, great prostration and delirium. 
Treatment is only prevention ; do not use pastures known to pro- 
duce this disease ; unbroken land of certain districts unsafe. 

Rheumatism is shown by hot, painful swellings at the joints, 
generally the hocks, stiffness in walking or may be unable to rise. 
Bathe joints with camphor and alcohol and give internally two 



T40 BIGGLE COW BOOK. 

drachms salicylate of soda every three hours until four ounces 
have been given ; keep warm and dry and give laxative food. 

Texas Fever, a disease of southern cattle which, when trans- 
mitted to northern cattle, is generally fatal in a few days. The 
spread of the disease is generally due to ticks; those from diseased 
animals contain the germs of the disease and by their bites trans- 
mit it. The indications are a high fever, staggering gait, urine of 
reddish brown to black, great prostration, unconsciousness, death. 
Most common in summer months ; unknown in the north after 
heavy frost. Prevention, avoidance of cattle from southern fever 
districts ; dipping of southern cattle to destroy the ticks. 

POINTERS ON DISINFECTION. 

The germs of disease are so small that only the most com- 
plete methods will render an infected building safe. 

Remove all litter, dirt and dust from floor, ceiling and walls. 

Old wood-work, as troughs, racks and flooring had better be 
replaced by new. 

All wood-work allowed to remain should be scrubbed at least 
three times with hot water and washing soda. 

After each washing apply with whitewash brush or, better, a 
spray pump, carbolic acid and water, one part of carbolic acid to 
fifty parts of water. 

Earth floors should be removed to depth of at least three 
inches or deeper if saturated with drainage and new earth or 
cement substituted. 

Do not apply whitewash and consider disinfection complete. 
Germs are well preserved under a coat of whitewash and cause 
trouble after whitewash peels off. So destroy the germs with 
carbolic spray before applying the coat of lime. 

Let the light into the stables ; it is death to many disease 
germs. 



Note. — No little discovery in recent years has done so much 
for the dairyman as the accidental application of air to udders 
suffering from lump, garget and fever. A io-cent bicycle pump 
is used to inflate the teat or teats and bag several times per day 
through a milk tube. The results are considered marvelous. 




Chapter XXVI. 
ROUND-UP. 

The higher the aim in dairying the better the achievement. — 
John Tucker. 

^jp^Hli Aim high ! 

WBL #lW| Keep in mind the milk record of 

4 ?fi the noble Holstein-Friesian cow, " Pie- 
.tertje 2d" — over 30,000 pounds in one 
year ! 

The Jersey cow, ' ' Princess 2d, ' ' produced 46 pounds 
and 12 y 2 ounces of butter in seven days ! "Bisson's 
Belle," a Jersey, yielded 1028 pounds of butter in a 
year ! 

Do not be contented with the present United 
States average of only 3000 pounds of milk and less 
than 200 pounds of butter per year. 

These high marks cannot be equaled, perhaps, by 
ordinary methods, but the low marks can be exceeded, 
to a certainty, by any dairyman who will study his 
business. 

Scales and the Babcock test are the enemies of 
the scrub cow. 

The silo will become universal, of course ; and 
peas will be used for silage as well as corn. 

The thoroughbred bull will push the scrub bull to 
the wall, and the home-raised cow will increase in favor. 

Advance in the science of breeding and feeding 
will be accompanied by advance in factory work. The 
factory system is not yet on a settled basis. Much is 



NOV 29 1913 

142 BIGGLE COW BOOK. 

yet to be learned about separators, about butter making, 
about cheese making, and about marketing. 

Experiments in calf-feeding prove that the great- 
est proportionate gain live weight is made by carefully 
fed calves under five weeks of age. The richest milk 
does not always produce weight fastest. The growth 
of one pound was made from an average of a trifle 
above one pound dry matter in the food fed in a series 
of tests at the experiment stations. 

Animals two years old will gain a pound of flesh 
for every ten or eleven pounds of digestible dry matter 
fed to them. 

To sum up the whole matter : I look for future 
dairy profits to come from better cows, from careful 
weighing and testing of milk, from scientific and hence 
economic feeding, from superior and well-marketed 
products, and from good care of the manure. 

Below are given the secretaries of the various 
Cattle Clubs and Breeders' Associations of the United 
States from whom information may be obtained : 
Aberdeen- Angus, Chas. W. Gray, Union Stock Yards, Chicago, 111. 
Ayrshire, C. M. Winslow, Brandon, Vt. 
Brown Swiss, CD. Nixon, Owego, N. Y. 
Devon, L. P. Sisson, Newark, Ohio. 
Dutch Belted, H. B. Richards, Easton, Pa. 
Galloway, C. W. Gray, Union Stock Yards, Chicago, 111. 
Guernsey, Win. H. Caldwell, Peterboro, N. H. 
Hereford, C. R. Thomas, Kansas City, Mo. 
Holderness, Truman A. Cole, Solsville, N. Y. 
Holstein-Friesian, F. L. Houghton, Brattleboro, Vt. 
Jersey, J. J. Hemingway, 8 W. 17th St., New York, N. Y. 
Polled Durham, J. H. Martz, Greenville, Ohio. 
Red Polled, Horley A. Martin, Gotham, Wise. 
Shorthorn, John W. Groves, Union Stock Yards, Chicago, 111. 



■ 

H ■ 1 1 



,'%' : '" 

•'/•#.*.' 



^M 



:;*>.- 



LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 




0001025041^ 



^^^B 



